


Derek's OnlyFans

by ReedMeme



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Barebacking, Bottom Derek Hale, Cheating, Cheating Derek Hale, Cuckolding, Cum Play, Domestic Violence, Drug Use, Dubious Consent, Emotional Constipation, Hurt Stiles Stilinski, Jockstraps, Knotting, M/M, Married Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski, Master/Pet, Master/Slave, OnlyFans, Porn With Plot, Puppy Play, S&M, Scents & Smells, Serious emotional pain, Watersports, emotional diarrhea, graphic smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:02:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 17
Words: 103,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23390650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReedMeme/pseuds/ReedMeme
Summary: Stiles finds his husband's OnlyFans page and cheating ways.  Initially hurt, delving deeper into the surprising unknown parts of his husband's life awakens his cuckolding desires and something else.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Original Male Character(s), Derek Hale/Other(s), Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 1633
Kudos: 464





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [IcyCryos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/IcyCryos/gifts).



> Sorry I haven't been on. But COVID has given me more time to write. As per usual, this isn't edit. I just wrote all of the chapters in 4 hours. So I hope it makes sense since it's 11 pm here now, and I'm going to bed. I'll write another chapter tomorrow. Gifting this to IcyCryos since a busy life made me forget that he had messaged me before. Didn't mean to ghost (life literally just made me forget). This isn't much, but I hope he enjoys it nonetheless. I hope all of you will too. I know I have a tendency of not finishing multi-chapter fics, but hopefully our current situation will force me to do otherwise. Not to mention, this plot is pretty straightforward and porny. 
> 
> Don't read this if you don't like cheating Derek and hurt Stiles fics.

Moving out of Beacon Hills was one of the hardest things we ever had to do, but something we did out of necessity due to my acceptance at Berkeley. Derek, to my surprise, was more than willing to go with me despite his desire to stay with the pack.

"All I need is you." He whispered to me the night he told me he would follow me, not for himself, but for the sake of our relationship. 

Although his words were clear, his tone said otherwise. I knew he needed the pack, even if he didn't say it out loud. But despite my insistence that he stayed behind and we could continue our relationship long distance, he insisted on coming along. We had a long fight about the whole situation. I didn't want him to compromise his happiness but was stubbornly refusing to change my plans about leaving, despite his many suggestions of alternatives. To my surprise, our fight ended with him declaring his love for me and proposing. Caught up in the moment, I said yes and we made love, hard, that night.

We had a small Were wedding, during one full-moon lit night. For my father, it was merely a "promise" ceremony with wedding ring-like rings. He disapproved of me marrying too young, but was aware of the seriousness of Derek's belief that I was his 'mate'. But for Weres, Derek said that it actually _was_ a wedding. That it was a ritual that forged a bond between mates for life. To him, it meant that I was his and he was mine. Of course due to his absurdly base aesthetic, he bought two, thick, black metal rings as our wedding rings. The whole pack was there to celebrate with us that night. It was small, but intimate and something that I would remember for the rest of my life. 

The ceremony helped ease some of the tension of Derek and I leaving the pack, no matter if it was only for a few years while I went to college. To be honest, I was relieved. I was excited about moving to a new city and to live a whole new life outside of the supernatural, even if for a little while. I loved my dad and the pack, but I wanted some room to breathe and to find myself outside of Beacon Hills. But, I was still glad that Derek came with me. 

But our limited timeline and our limited bank accounts didn't really allow us to have a honeymoon. Instead we opted to go straight to Oakland and start our new lives. The happiness from our marriage was brief. Rent was expensive, and my scholarship wasn't enough to cover my tuition and basic necessities. Derek struggled to find a job due to his lack of education, and he was very hard on himself the first few weeks, until he found odd jobs here and there. Further compounding our frustrations was the fact that due to the random schedules he got from these jobs, my course load got more time intensive as the months progressed, causing me to spend less time at home. 

On the other hand, we did make do of the time we did have together and continued to fuck like bunnies as much as possible. A year later, we had settled into a pattern that worked out for both of us. Most of my days and evenings were spent on campus, while we tried to get together at night as much as we could. But depend on Derek's job of the week, we sometimes didn't even have that and would only see each other the very next morning before I once again had to leave for classes. It was a humbly busy and domestic routine that we had settled into. But for a horny college student like myself? The occasional fuck was never enough to satisfy my excessive libido. This was how I stumbled onto the OnlyFans page that changed my life. 

I overheard a rumour one day while studying in the library (actually, I fell asleep in a cubicle and was woken up by two gossipy co-eds chatting in the cubicle in front of me). There was a rumour that one of our TAs actually had a porn page set up at OnlyFans. 

His name was Brody. Just like his name, he was an obnoxious, rich frat boy business major that TA'd for my Economics class. Not only was he named the part, but he also looked and acted the part. He was blonde, impossibly muscled, and cocky as hell. But to his credit, he had the brain to match. He was a jackass to most of his students, including to me, unless he knew you personally or thought you were attractive. There were even times that I wondered whether I should have gotten a higher grade for a paper or a test than I should have had. But considering Econ was just an elective and I was passing, I didn't press the matter. 

It was another busy, and lonely night on the campus that I decided to look into these rumours. Derek was out on another odd job and couldn't talk, and I was studying at an underused corner in the main campus building's lower floor. I was the only person that I could see, and the paper I was supposed to be writing was pissing me off. So, after peeking around to make sure that I really was alone, I searched online for Brody's OnlyFans account. Obnoxiously, his username was "DatBroD". Creating and account and finding him was an easy enough task, unfortunately I found that I couldn't view any of his videos, all of them seemed to be locked behind a pay wall. He event set the price at an absurd $19.99 a month. But my curiosity, and libido, getting the best of me, I paid for it thinking all the while that I would only do it for a month before cancelling my subscription.

Scrolling through his page was like scrolling through a narcissist's wet dream. It was filled with pictures of him posing in various levels of undress, many of which were completely naked. His poses harkened to the ones I saw in my dad's fitness magazines when I was little, flexing different parts of the muscle. I couldn't help but get hard and envious of his marine-like muscled body. He had a light dusting of hair on his chest, perfectly symmetrical and groomed to compliment his well defined pecs. His abs and obliques were extremely defined, something I only ever saw in super hero movies. 

There were many videos of him jacking off in different parts his apartment, showcasing his thick, long, cock, that was shaved smooth. I couldn't help be frustrated by the fact that I found this cocky bastard arousing. My cock strained my pants and I couldn't help but readjust myself as I continued to peruse his page, skipping large swaths of it in the process. I immediately stopped when I saw a video of Brody sitting on chair, with a man's head settled on his lap. Looking around quickly to make sure I was alone, I plugged in my headphones onto my laptop and played the video. The video's description was an eye catching one liner: 'Married jock, SourWolf88, sucks me off'. 

The first thing I heard was obnoxious techno music playing in the background while Brody leaned back in his chair while playing with his nipple with one hand, and caressing the man's short hair with the other. The video must've been filmed from Brody's webcam, and the angle only showed the other man from his shoulders and up. I watched as the black haired man bobbed on Brody's thick member, the jock moaning in pleasure. 

"Yeah, you like that big cock, slut?" Brody said cockily, looking down on the guy with a smirk. 

I saw the guy nod, before turning his attention back on the cock in front of him. 

"What's that? I didn't hear you." Brody laughed before pulling the guy's head back with a fistful of hair. 

The guy grunted at the pull and I had a better glimpse of his large biceps when he continued jacking Brody's hidden cock before answering the blonde jock with a raspy, wet voice, "yeah. I like your big cock."

"Better than your husband's dicklett?" Brody insisted. 

The man nodded again before going down to, what I assume, deep throat Brody's member, noisily slobbering his way down and gagging briefly. Brody jerked his hips up with a smirk, causing the man to cough and choke before being released with a contented sigh from Brody. 

The man looked up again and coughed before answering in a broken, raspy voice. "Yeah. I don't really suck his dick." 

"But you love sucking mine?" Brody smiled widely before shoving the cock back in the other man's throat, not even giving him the opportunity to answer. 

I had to readjust myself in my pants, my hard cock straining in my jeans. I was stroking it firmly through the fabric as I watched and listened to the obscene slurps and moans on the screen. I was so lost in the scene that even the bad background music was muted behind the erotically charged groaning and slurping from the two men. Then Brody stood up, held the other jock's head in between his hands and began to fuck his face. As much as it turned me on, I did wish they had filmed in a different angle. I wanted to watch the black haired jock suck on Brody's cock, instead of just watching it from the back. With another cursory look around, I unbuttoned my pans and fished my cock out of my jeans and started jacking off frantically in my little hidden corner to the video in front of me.

Eventually the obscene noises on the screen reached a crescendo just as I began to feel the pulse of come bubbling up from my balls. That was when Brody pulled away and moved sideways to show his body in profile to the camera, jacking his long cock fast and hard. I started coming early, aiming my dick at the wall beside me just as the other jock moved in profile as well, his head tilted up and mouth open under Brody's cock. I had one of the most intense orgasms in recent months at the same time thick streams of cum shot out of Brody's dick into the other jock's mouth. A few seconds later, the profile face of the other jock registered in my mind. My body was still shuddering, my cock still pulsing and spluttering cum as the image of my husband's face stuck out his tongue to catch Brody's thick seed, before leaning forward to take it in his mouth. Brody jerked forward to bury his long cock to the hilt, burying Derek's nose into his pubes. I watched Derek's throat pulsing as swallowed Brody's seed and nursed on his cock. 

He lifted his hand to grab Brody's thigh, as if to hold the man in place, showcasing our tell-tale black wedding rings for the viewers to see. I watched as Derek pulled back, letting the long cock slip out from his lips before giving the head a cursory kiss. I sat in my little nook in shock at what I had just seen, my limp cock out and cold on my jeans, and my cum splattered on the wall beside me, as the screen before me faded into black. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftershocks of the discovery and a budding desire. 
> 
> *WARNING*: This chapter may be triggering. (Particularly Stile's initial reaction to the cheating).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's chapter two. Again, a warning -
> 
> *WARNING*: This chapter may be triggering. (Particularly Stile's initial reaction to the cheating).

After the shock had faded, I quickly shoved my limp dick back into my pants before diving into the laptop in front of me. Full of denial, I played back the video and paused it at the moment of Brody's release and studied the face frozen on the screen. It look like Derek, but was it really? It couldn't be. I began scrolling through Brody's feed once again, looking for other videos or photos of his time with SourWolf88 through the throng of posing photos and solo jack off sessions. The next video I saw was another close up video of just the back of SourWolf's head, and I huffed out in frustration when the black haired man never turned once before short video ended. I cussed out loud before scrolling through his feed once again before stopping on another video. This one was captioned: "Mounting a married man."

The two of them were in profile once again, but this time on the bed. SourWolf88 was on all fours, his face buried in the bed covers while his ass was perked up, with Brodie behind him. I played the video and turned the volume up to see if I could hear anything. The two of them were further away from the webcam, and as a result, I could barely hear their grunting and moaning over the obnoxious house music playing in the background. 

I studied SourWolf's profile as well as I could, considering the quality of the video. The visible side of his body was well muscled and defined, but it was difficult to tell if it was Derek, particularly since SourWolf's head was buried in the covers. Then Brody forced him to flip over, but unfortunately SourWolf flipped his body with his back away from the camera. I was hoping to get a glimpse of Derek's telltale tattoo, but instead I settled for pausing the video just as SourWolf's face came into view. But despite Brody's absurd channel pricing, his camera sucked and the video only caught a faint blur of a face as SourWolf flipped over. Brody began to pound into him harder and faster, with deep, long strokes. But due to the distance, it was difficult to make anything out. I couldn't even see if there was actually any penetration, or if it was just for show. I tried hard to listen to the words that left Brody's mouth as he loomed over SourWolf's prone body, seemingly ramming his member into him fast and hard. I saw SourWolf whisper something back, just making out the movement of a mouth on a barely visible face. Then with one, deep, spluttering thrust, Brody collapsed on top of SourWolf's body and the two shared a deeply intimate kiss while still connected at the hips. 

I don't know how much time I spent scrolling through Brody's page, but I only found a few other videos with SourWolf. Unfortunately all of them didn't have a clear front view of SourWolf's face, or his back. There were two videos of them in the shower, but only showing both of them in profile from the neck down. These videos at least confirmed from the close angle, and a better camera, that Brody was indeed fucking SourWolf and fucking him bareback. Both of them remained relatively quiet on both videos, their joint groans and moans echoing in the chamber of the shower stall. The other shower video had Brody fucking SourWolf in the suspended congress position, with the jock holding the other in place as he fucked him against the wall. Briefly I saw SourWolf's black wedding ring once again that looked an awful lot like mine. 

It wasn't my fault that my body had a brief refractory period and found all of these videos erotic. I got hard once again as I watched these videos, and felt a trickle of precum leak from my cock tip as I heard the faint moans between the louder sounds of slapping flesh. 

I looked at the wedding band in my hand, touching it between my fingers, and wondered how common these rings were. To my frustration, there weren't any more videos of the two of them together beyond the ones I saw. Their exploits seemed to only have started at least a month back. Just as I was about to give up in frustration, willing to admit that perhaps all my doubts were merely a matter of coincidence that I could never assuage, I realized that I knew SourWolf88's username. As a last resort, I looked for the name on OnlyFans. 

To my luck, the account existed. To my dismay, it was locked behind a pay wall of $10.00. I couldn't see anything beyond the small user icon that featured a torso that could be anyone's. I twiddled my thumbs for a moment, considering all of my options. I even went to Pornhub and other porn websites in hopes of finding "SourWolf88's" content up in the internet to see for free, to no avail. I bit my thumb as I considered my options and whether my doubts were worth it. Having already spent $20 dollars for Brody's page, another $10 dollars would mean no coffee for me for at least a week. Resolving to instead drink free, and shitty, coffee from the student lounge, I paid for SourWolf88's page. 

My worst suspicions were validated the moment the page unlocked. SourWolf88 was indeed my husband, Derek Hale. 

I stood up from my desk and ran into the bathroom, into a stall, to vomit in the sink and cry. The tears ran down my cheek despite my efforts to hold them back, and I punched the wall in frustration. A myriad of emotions were flooding my system, from anger, jealousy, blind hatred, confusion, to arousal. The latter brought me back to confusion, then anger and jealousy, and back around to arousal. It was a cyclical range of emotions that I found difficult to juggle. So much so that my breathing became harsh, and I began to feel light headed. Realizing the start of a panic attach, I tried to calm myself and breathe evenly to rebalance myself. But the image of Brody mounting and pounding my husband from behind flooded my brain once more, and with it came the flood of complicated emotions that nauseated me into unconsciousness. The last thing I remember was leaning back into the stall wall before the darkness took me. 

When next I awoke, I was lying down on the cold tiles of the bathroom stall, my back and legs aching from the uncomfortable position, my tears dry and crusted on my face. I moved myself up and stumbled over to the sink. I relished the feel of the cold water on my skin as I washed my face, and felt relief as it soothed my sore throat. I checked the time and found that only an hour had passed since I had last checked. To my relief, I also discovered that my things were where I had left them, and there was still no soul in sight. 

I walked over to my laptop and took a deep breathe before turning it back on and unlocking the screen. I was greeted once more of a picture of my husband on the latest post of his OnlyFan's page. He wore nothing but a jockstrap, the straps framing his ass, flexing his biceps, with his head tilted to the side and his back exposed for all to see. His telltale triskelion tattoo clear on his skin. It was only now that I began to notice small details I had missed when I first unlocked the page. I knew that the ass on my screen was Derek's ass, but it was smooth instead of the hairy one I was familiar with. 

Scrolling down, I perused through more pictures of him in various states of undress, sometimes wearing underwear and jockstraps, while he was completely naked in others. These were photos he seemed to be taking throughout his day, in various places that were both familiar and unfamiliar to me. There were photos of him in the gym, wearing a stringer tank top, sweaty after a work out, taking a photo in front of the mirrors like one of those douche bags we always used to make fun of. 

To my surprise, I found that he had shaved his thick, bushy, armpit hair. They were things that I liked to play with when we were intimate, but now there was only skin. There were several men posing next to him, both of whom were clearly hairier and burlier than Derek's tightly muscled frame. One had a hand around Derek's shoulder, wearing a deep cut yellow tank top and flexing a bicep. The other took a body building pose, and I could see the hair on his shoulders and back atop a mountain of muscle, painted with elegant tattoos, underneath an all too revealing red tank top. Derek was smiling a goofy, crooked smile, a small piece of tongue peeking out between his teeth. All three men wore a thick, obnoxious, chain necklace. Derek's had a little doggie bone charm at the front that bore his name. The photo was captioned, "Weekly workout with the daddies". 

I closed my laptop with a slam before burying my face in my hands. I took deep, calming breathes before getting to my feet and began to pace around, trying to shake off the tension that was building in my muscles. I was intent on not fainting again. I moved over to the window and rested my cheek on the cold glass, letting the chill cool my hot body, all too aware of the hardness of my cock in my lose jeans. 

I looked at my phone and checked the time once again. It was half past 8. Derek was scheduled to work at a construction site as evening crew all the way out at Telegraph Hill in San Francisco. He wasn't scheduled to come back until 9 in the morning, meaning this would be one of the days I'd be sleeping alone. I searched for his name in my contacts and sent through the call. 

It only rang twice before he answered. "Hey babe. How're you?"

Strangely, his voice went through me like thunder, shocking my system into paralysis for a moment. All I did was breathe out slowly onto my phone. 

"Stiles, you alright?" Derek asked quizzically. 

The question jolted me back into place, and I cleared my sore throat before answering. "Just tired. Been a... long night."

"Sorry to hear that. You coming home soon?" He asked nonchalantly, his voice briefly growing faint a the tail end of the question as I hear dishes clinking in the background. 

"I don't know." I say honestly, my mind still reeling at my discovery. 

"Well, just to let you know I'm making that pasta you like. Just heat it up in the microwave when you get home." I hear him say as something sizzled loudly in the background. 

The domesticity of his words off-balanced me once again. "You made me something?"

I hear Derek chuckle in the background as the sizzling sound flared up again. "Of course. It's what loving husbands do."

I let the words sink in for a moment, taking in the weight of them and trying to gauge the tone behind the voice that uttered them. "Do you really love me?"

"Of course. You know I do." He said quickly and freely, with a small huff of laughter in his voice. "I _miss_ you and I love you. We really need to stop talking like this..."

"Like ships in the night. Just passing each other by." I mumbled into my phone. 

"Yeah." He laughed at the phrase we shared with each other whenever we missed the other. "So, when are you gonna be on leave sailor?"

"Soon. I don't know." I said almost breathlessly, my chest tightening at the confusion in my heart. 

"Okay. Well, I gotta finish cooking and clean up before heading out for work. Hey, wake me up when you get in tomorrow. Doesn't matter what time, I want to see you before you head out for your afternoon classes." 

"Okay," I said, "will do."

"Sounds good. I love you babe." He replied. 

"Love you t-" I began to say before the other line cut out.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles deepens his research into Derek's indiscretions. We find a name and more about Derek's OnlyFans page.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, don't read on if you don't like cheating Derek fics. 
> 
> Derek gets it on with an older, hairy, tattooed guy in this chapter.

By the time I managed to make my way home, it was close to 11 at night. Derek had already left for 'work' and I found the meal he prepared for me on the fridge with a little hand written note; "to my loving mate." I stared at the note for several minutes, torn between crumpling it up and throwing it away, and giving it a little kiss at the sentiment. 

I went through my routine that night like a living doll. I ate the food he had cooked in silence. I cleaned up, showered, brushed my teeth and went to bed. But I didn't close my eyes nor could I lull myself to sleep. After an hour of restless tossing and turning, I got up and went over to my desktop PC. I stared at the blank browser page for a second, before once again logging in to Derek's OnlyFans page. This time, I scrolled down all the way to the start. 

The very first post was several months into our life here in Oakland. It was fairly innocent. It was an old photo of Derek back at his loft in Beacon Hills, wearing one of his Henley shirts. It was a photo that I had taken after we started dating. The caption on the photo was oddly endearing. 

"Hi, I'm Derek. Thanks for signing up to my OnlyFans. Someone suggested that this was an easy way to make money so... here I am. I hope you'll like what you see. I'm new to this, and I don't really know what to do. But I'll find out."

The comments were fairly innocuous, some welcoming him to the site and showering him with praises of how attractive he was. Others were flat out demanding all the sexual things they wanted from him. Regardless, nothing in his first post revealed what drove him to create an account. 

The next few posts were more photos with captions. For the most part these were photos of him after working out. Most of the photos were taken in our apartment, and all of them were of him in either sweats or shorts, but always sweaty after a workout. His captions varied from revealing how he was feeling that day, and his motivation to keep up with his workout and live a new life in the unnamed new city he had just moved into. He still had a light dusting of hair on his treasure trail, as well as the dark hair on his armpits. 

It was a full month after he had joined when Derek posted his first revealing photo. It was just a full frontal shot, but one arm flexed, while he covered his crotch with the other. His hairy pubes peeked out from behind his hand and traveled up to his navel. There was a clear blush on his cheeks as he stared intently at the camera. The comments were far more revealing and sexually intense than they had been before. 

This time, the commenters were more brazen in their demands for nudity, and more. 

_You're hot an all man, but at 10 bucks per month, you gotta give us more_. Said one comment. 

_Moooore_!

_Fucking hot_!

_Work on your traps. Let us see that dick_!

_Give us a video man_! _At least a jack off vid, please_?

Derek's next post wasn't until a few days later, and this time it was a video. 

The video was simple and short, only about 5 minutes long. He was on our bed, and I could tell from the angle of the video that he had filmed using the laptop that my dad had bought him one Christmas. He was wearing a black tank top and boxers that he undressed after drawing back from the camera. The angle had a good view of his hairy balls and half hard cock, nestled atop his bushy pubes. Derek began to stroke himself slowly while staring intently at the camera. His black wedding ring was clear on his hand as he stroked his cock. 

_Omg_! _You're married_? _Hot_! One comment wrote.

Derek stroked himself with relative easer, if not some level of furor, reaching his climax quicker than he normally would. His balls danced as he came, streams of cum shooting out of his cock head, landing on his black tank top, and a few on his face. After the orgasm induced shuddering subsided, he moved once again to turn of the video. In the comment section below, Derek interacted with his audience for the first time. 

_You're married_? Tad4917 commented. 

_Guess I can't hide it now_. Derek confessed. _Yeah_. _Under a year_. 

_He know_? RuebnFux asked. 

_No_. _But gotta make money somehow_. _Can't find anything else_. Derek truthfully confessed. 

_Hustle is hustling_. Another commenter wrote. 

_DM me_. _I have advice on how you can make more money if you're already willing to jack off on cam_. LeteoFran76 wrote. There were no other comments in the video. 

The next few posts were more muscle posing photos, and a few more brief jack off videos. But then Derek posted his first video with someone else in the screenshot. It was heavily muscled and intricately tattooed man with a red tank top in Derek's gym photo. It was captioned "Jack Dixon massage". 

The video was longer than normal, and was filmed somewhere I didn't recognize. Derek was atop a massage table, face down, his bare body angled in such a way that it showed his ass. The man, whom I guessed is Jack Dixon, poured oil on Derek's back before kneading it slowly with is large hands. The white tank top stood out of his hairy, and painted skin, and the plaid boxers he wore were oddly plain considering the situation. His large hands massaged my husband's back slowly, kneading deep with his fingers and knuckles while making his way down. Each firm touch seemed to elicit a groan from Derek as Jack slowly made his way down. Then before he reached Derek's ass, he drew back and skipped to Derek's legs.

Jack made long, measured strokes down my husband's leg and thigh, kneading the muscles with both hands. He moved to each calf in that slow, measured way of his, and adding oil when necessary, before finally moving to Derek's ass. He gave each cheek a quick slap before massaging them too. He took more time in this particular area, and Derek was surprisingly quiet in the meantime. The Jack spread Derek's hole apart, showcasing his well muscled ass, and the ring of black hair that surrounded a pink, pulsing hole. For a few seconds, Jack played with the pulsing anus with his thumb, but seemingly careful not to penetrate. 

"Turn around." Were the first words that Jack said in the video, and obediently my husband turned at the command. 

I experienced some relief to find that Derek was still surprisingly soft during the whole thing, but this didn't seem to matter to Jack and the older man continued his ministrations. He started with Derek's muscled legs once again, before skipping the pelvis and making his way up. He caressed and massaged Derek's abs, before switching over to his arms. He oiled and massaged Derek's arms and biceps, moving them around and asking him my husband to flex for camera, caressing each mound of muscle. Then to my surprise he bend over and began lightly kissing Derek's chest lightly, before making his way to Derek's left nipple. I saw a tongue dart out to give a light lick at Derek's nub, causing Derek's cock to twitch at the sensation. Jack seemed to have noticed as well and began to lightly lick at the nipple once more, causing Derek's cock to twitch back and forth. With his other hand, Jack began to pinch and tweak Derek's other nipple before sucking the other one into his mouth and biting it with his teeth. For the first time, Derek moaned out loud, and his cock jumped up in attention. Jack did this for some time and watched as Derek's cock got harder and harder until it was standing straight up in attention. He teased and nipped the nipples continuously, switching between the two of them until Derek's dick began to leak precum. By this point Derek's member was hard and thick with arousal, leaking a clear fluid that could be seen by the camera. 

Then just as quickly as he had taken Derek's nipples in his mouth, Jack moved over and enveloped Derek's cock in one, fell, swoop. 

"Oh fuck!" I heard Derek exclaim, his thigh buckling up to meet the warm mouth, but Jack's large hands brought them back down onto the massage table. 

There was no romance here. Jack seemed to know that Derek's arousal was at it's peak and made no qualms about what he intended to do. He sucked hard and fast, the sounds of suction echoing obscenely in the spacious room. Derek's moans was the music that set Jack's rhythm, bobbing up and down my husband's manhood. I saw Derek's hand grip the table hard before thrusting up once more into Jack's mouth, his balls pulsing with his release. I watched as Jack swallowed every drop. 

Derek's cock fell out of Jack's mouth with an obscene pop. He licked his lips before looking down at Derek's heaving, sweaty, naked body. Then he slowly moved to the head of the massage table and stood next to Derek's flushed face. He caressed it slowly with one hand before cupping my husband's jaw and moving his face to the side.

I don't know when it happened, but Jack hard cock was hard and peeking out of his boxer's slit. It was thick, surprisingly big despite the distance from the camera, with a flushed red, head. 

"Open." Jack commanded as he gripped Derek's jaw. Derek obeyed his command as quickly as the words were uttered.

Jack began to jack off furiously, his panting and grunting growing more frantic with each stroke. He looked into Derek's eyes the entire time, keeping hold of my husband's jaw until he began to moan out loud. Then, he moved forward with shaking legs as he began to release his load into my husband's mouth. The first few thick streams could be seen shooting out of his cock and into Derek's mouth. He even tilted Derek's face up as if he was making sure the cum wouldn't fall out. His thick, throbbing, dick moved closer into Derek's open mouth until only the head was barely inside. 

"Close your mouth and swallow. Suck on the head." Jack commanded. 

Derek did as he was told, closing his mouth around Jack's cock head while Jack massaged my husband's throat. Jack threw his head back as his balls continued to pulse, and his cock head nestles neatly in Derek's suckling lips. 

"Good boy." He mumbled before bending down to give Derek a long, sloppy, kiss that echoed in the empty room. 

It wasn't long after the video ended that I had noticed the wetness on my hand. Looking down I realized that I had taken my cock out at a certain point and had coated my skin in my own release. I had just cum at the first video of my husband cheating on me. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jeez, I hope these chapters are flowing well because I haven't edited/reviewed them. Sorry if they don't make sense. 
> 
> Please point out any grammatical stuff. It'll actually help (especially if you point it out kindly). I'll try to find and make the appropriate changes so it flows better for future readers . Thanks and sorry. Seriously. I'm Asian and Canadian, so I feel a lot of unnecessary guilt and remorse at any given moment.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek has a sexy surprise for Stiles. Stiles finds more things that emphasize how estranged he has become with his husband.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Told you I'd be putting up a new chapter. Just a short one. Hopefully it's sexy enough.

I was confused, to say the least. A few hours prior I had been heartbroken at my husband's betrayal, but now I had watched and jacked off on a video of Derek cheating on me. The guy wasn't even my type. If anything, someone like Brody would be my type if he wasn't such a jackass. Or someone like Derek. But I couldn't deny the fact that watching that man touch my husband in a way that only I ever should, and the way my husband responded to Jack's every touch and command, enthralled me like never before. My sticky release was proof of this fact. 

I felt guilt. I felt misery. Every negative emotion flooded into me after I came, no longer stoppered by my arousal. I quickly cleaned up the mess I made on myself, and hid all evidence of my activities, before curling up in bed and succumbing to the darkness. 

I was awoken with soft kisses on my neck. I mumbled in my sleep, reaching up to caress a smooth jaw line. The kisses traced up my clavicle, up my throat, to my chin, before reaching my mouth. A thick, wet, tongue parted my lips and I leaned into the kiss. My mind was still hazy, but the kiss, the mouth, and the scent was familiar so I leaned into the sensation. I felt hands reaching beneath the comforter and gripped my cock while a heavy weight went atop me. The kisses continued while big, strong hands, jacked my hard cock. I snaked my hands up the weight atop me, pulling him down by his neck closer to me. We both began to moan together as our tongues wrestled, while the hand underneath the covers stroked my swollen member. 

His heavy weight pressed down on me, burning my skin with his head. It was a pleasant burn that warmed me to the core, and my body jerked up in response wanting more. Teeth nibbled on my ear lobe, licked and nipped the skin of my neck, and too deep, long, breathes on crook of my neck. There was some thrusting but no penetration. We were just bodies rutting against each other in rhythm to the beating of our hearts. It wasn't long before our moans and groans reached a crescendo and I shot my release between our forms, the comforter had been tossed aside who knows when. Derek came almost at the same time, celebrating his own release by clamping down on my shoulder, his teeth almost breaking the skin, the way a Were would mark its mate during intimacy. With a deep rumble in his chest, he shot his seed out from between us, painting my chest, my neck, and even my chin. Thick, long, streams of cum coated my body, his ejaculation seemed to last forever before he finally collapsed atop my spent form. 

"Mhm, fuck." Derek's voice groaned into my mouth, moving his lips down to kiss my bottom lip before I felt his tongue lapping at my chin. It took me a moment to realise that he was lapping up his own release. This fact woke me up like no other, realizing that this was the first time I had actually ever seen him eat his own cum. I watched as he made his way down, sucking and lapping up each puddle of cum, whether it was mine or his own until he reached my cock. Then to my utter surprise, he swallowed my now soft member to the base, even using his tongue to lap up at my balls. I couldn't help but groan out loud at the sensation, the breathe from his nose tickling my pubes. 

"Holy shit!" I exclaimed at the unfamiliar sensation. Then I felt and heard the rumbling in his throat. It was that familiar throaty Were chuckle of his. He detached himself from my crotch before moving up and kissing me passionately once again. This time I could smell and taste the cum in his mouth. 

"I'm glad you liked it." He chuckled with soft kisses on my neck. 

"I've never seen you go down on me before. Or eat cum for that matter." I pointed out. 

"What are you talking about? Yes I have." He chuckled again before making his way down to kiss my chest. 

"No. You haven't. I've always been the one to swallow. You've... you never have." I insisted. 

"Yes, I have." He pressed, before moving up to stare into my face. "Besides, are you complaining?" 

I took a moment before I responded, looking into his eyes that held an unfamiliar deviousness that I had never seen before. It had been sometime since I saw him smile. At the very least, I couldn't remember anymore. 

"No." I finally confessed before the change clicked into my brain. "You shaved."

"Mhm?" Derek asked as he rolled over on his side of the bed, tucking his naked body underneath the covers. "My face? Yeah."

"I don't remember when I last saw you this smooth." I pointed out, only realising a second later the weight of my words. Derek had one hand behind his head, showcasing his smooth armpits and, before he had tucked himself underneath the covers, smooth pubes. 

"I shave sometimes." He answered groggily, thinking that I only meant his face. "Looks better smooth..."

I could tell that he was drifting into slumber, his breathe evening out, a contented look in his face. I tried shaking him awake. 

"Derek," I said while shoving his muscular shoulders. 

"Mhm", he grumbled before falling deeper into sleep. 

I watched his prone body for a minute before a soft alarm pulled me out of my reverie. I quickly turned off the alarm that signaled I had only an hour before I had my first class of the day. Derek seemed to have completely ignored the alarm and was making his telltale Were snores. I knew that in a few minutes, the heavy breathes would evolve into little rumbles, before graduating to a steady, deep, grumble-like snore.

I made my way up and out of the bed, heading to the bathroom when something pulled my attention. On the floor was Derek's clothes, the jeans and button down he wore to work. There was a plain, old t-shirt underneath the plaid, and his dirty, hole ridden socks. But what startled me was his underwear. Derek was always a boxers kind of guy. I fished out the fabric that was peeking out of his jeans. It was a dirty jockstrap, with a stain on the crotch. I didn't need to bring it close to my face to know it had been used and not washed for some time. The musk was heavy and actually made my head swim when I tried to take a sniff. The inside was crusted with stains, the fabric turning a bit yellow and stiff where his cock would be nestled in. I had never seen Derek wear anything other than boxers, so when had he started wearing jockstraps? This stain was familiar to me. I haven't even really left my teenaged years, and I've painted my fair share of socks with similar coloured crusts. This led me to wonder something else; did the taste and smell of cum in his breathe come after he ate our release? Or had it been there before? Had I missed the taste and smell of it during the first kiss due to the muddle of my sleep? 

I walked over to our dresser and pulled open his drawer and found a surprising selection of underwear I had never seen before. Most were jockstraps, but some were boxer briefs and some were tight, crotch conforming underwear contraption I had never seen before. One seemed like tight, sheer, black briefs with a pouch, that was made with stretchy fabric. It left nothing to the imagination. There were even several leather numbers I didn't recognize. I looked over at my slumbering husband and wondered at the man I had married. It was then I realized the severity of our disconnect. 

It had been some time since I had actually done our laundry together since we were awake at such different times. For some time, I've gone and done my own laundry as he did his. I went to the closet and rooted through his clothes and found a clear tonal shift in his wardrobe. Although his other typical clothes were still there, I found odd articles of clothing I had never seen him wear before. He was always a Henley and leather jacket sort of guy, but instead I found a larger number of tank tops with deep cut sides, stringers, and sweat pants that seemed to small and tight for his large frame. All of these were clothes that he had never worn before. At least, not to my knowledge. More were hidden Derek was never the type to wear any form of jewellery. Now it seemed that he had a collection of thick chains of varying length, leather collars, some of which were studded with spikes, different charms with his name etched on them that ranged from doggie bones, to military tags. There was even a leather dog mask that threw me for a loop just as much as the metal cock cage that was nestled underneath. 

My phone alarm rang again, pulling me out of my investigation. This time I turned it off instead of the snooze button. I put everything back where they belonged and headed out into the bathroom. I spared a look at my husbands sleeping, snoring form, and studied his face for a minute. Ever the deep sleeper, I compared what I saw with the man in my memories. His face was smoother now and his usually persistent 5 o'clock shadow was nowhere in sight. On his neck was a thick chain with the white doggie tag that I had seen on the video. Had that always been there all this time while we were being intimate? Even when we were kissing just moments ago, how had I not noticed? On his left nipple was a piercing, a silver barbell through the nub. When did he get that? But what drew my attention was something peeking out underneath the covers. Very slowly I peeled back the covers until his abs and crotch were exposed. There on his skin, a dark, intricate, tribal-like tattoo snaked down just beneath his navel, down and towards his crotch, just above the base of his dick that had been shaved smooth. Even his balls were shaved smooth. 

The tattoo was oddly beautiful, and intricately designed. The stark reality of a new tattoo I had never noticed on my husband was jarring. More so because of what a Were needed to do to _get_ a lasting tattoo. Their healing metabolism had a tendency of mending most wounds before they left permanent marks on their skin, including tattoos. The only way to permanently paint a Were's body was, of all things, with fire. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles tries to organize his feelings and ends up watching another video that reveals a little more about Derek's motivation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll try to update everyday (doing good so far), if not every the day after. I'm not gonna overthink things this time. I'm not writing War & Peace. Also, self-quarantine literally gives me no choice in the matter.

I was distracted. I had sent Derek a text an hour ago and he had yet to respond. Although it wasn't really a surprise. He would be sleeping until about 7 in the evening before getting ready for another midnight shift. At least, a few days ago that's what I would believe. But this Derek was a stranger to me. A mystery. I hated to admit it, especially in this case, but I loved a mystery even if it was my own husband. 

I found it difficult to keep my focus during most of my lectures. My mind kept wandering back to Derek's OnlyFans page. More than once I caught myself clicking on my browser and halfway to logging on when I realized where I was and became all too conscious of all the people behind me in a crowded lecture hall. How had Derek been able to hide such a seemingly large part of his life from me all of this time? Why was he doing this? I narrowed down the reasons into two specific possibilities considering our situation; money and desire. It was true that we were struggling for cash, and I insisted on not going to my dad or the pack for help in this matter. But would Derek resort to this just to make ends meet? Or was it because Derek no longer found his sexual desires fulfilled at home? We were supposed to be newlyweds, but in hindsight it seemed like we bypassed the honeymoon phase entirely and found ourselves skipping onto an estranged and stressed marriage. I didn't think that was the case, but the evidence bludgeoning me in the face would prove otherwise. My inattention was even worse during my Econ class. 

Brody sat, as per usual, obnoxiously at the corner of the class fiddling with his phone while the professor lectured. He never really moved unless it was time for him to pass along some handouts or collect any tests. His responsibilities were mostly relegated to grading and running the Tutorials. I watched him with curiosity, wondering how one ridiculous frat boy could turn my life upside down. In the past, his existence in my universe basically boiled down to either indifference or passive disdain. Now, he had been the catalyst that opened the floodgates for my existential crisis. Is my marriage failing? Had my inattentiveness been the cause of Derek's infidelity? Wasn't I attractive anymore? Am I so unlovable? Was everything we had been through, all the monsters and creatures of the night, the cruel men and women, and the dying bodies not enough to bond us anymore? I thought I had understood what bonds meant to Weres. Had I been so wrong all this time? 

Then again, I pictured Scott. It was true that he was territorial and hopelessly devoted to Allison, but only for a time. They were ride or die, some would say. Then one died and the other continued to ride. After that, I thought Kira would be the one. Once again, the very reliable 'Were devotion' popped up again. But eventually that ended too and Scott moved on far easier than one would have expected for someone supposedly so devoted. Was Derek the same? Maybe he had been devoted once upon a time but had now moved on. Was it just cowardice, fear of more failures, or something else that stopped him from being honest with me? What was stopping me from ending things now? After all, in civil society I would have every right to. 

These thoughts threatened to derail my mental stability as I fought between trying to take in any part of the professor's lecture. But every time my eyes drifter towards Brody's muscular form, my mind would suddenly be filled with the image of him mounting my husband. The entire time I had known Derek, I had never pictured him being so sexually passive. He was anything but. But the truth was on film. He acted like a little bitch, for a _human_ frat boy no less.

No. I was wrong. The voices in my head (normal people call them thoughts) pointed out the historically obvious. Kate. Kate held the power in their relationship while Derek was just along for the ride. Was this situation something similar? I was confident that Derek had emotionally developed since Kate, becoming stronger in realizing what he wanted and choosing what was right for him and for the people that mattered. Unless, did I no longer matter? 

This part of me kept going back to the fact that objectively, it made sense that Derek would bottom for a Brody and a Jack considering his history of submission. If we were to consider just the shallow, physical, ideations of a mate, Brody and Jack had me beat in spades. Both were more stereotypically masculine in different, substantial ways, than I was. Both of them were obviously more muscular, and one was significantly hairier. Both seemed to carry themselves with a confidence that I never had. Both had significantly larger cocks. Both had made my Derek submit. I should be angrier than I currently was. I should have been more demanding in my fury and desire for answers. I would have been within my right to rant and rave and take my grief out on the man who betrayed me. Instead... instead... I find myself doing something else. I find myself realising something else. What should have made me angry, instead turned me on. What was wrong with me?

"It has been more profitable for us to bind together in the wrong direction than to be alone in the right one." The professor's voice broke through my reverie, as he emphasized his point by slapping the whiteboard with his hand. "95 per cent of economics is common sense – made to look difficult, with the use of jargon and mathematics. But break it down into what it is. Break it down to want versus need versus supply. What do people want? What do you offer? What do others offer compared to you? Does the market resent one vendor for supplying something it solely cannot? Does the consumer? Monopolies breed decay in the market. As they say ladies and gentlemen, variety is the spice of life." 

Shortly after class, I tried calling Derek again but my call went unanswered. It was just after three, and Derek was still probably asleep. I was half considering on skipping the rest of my classes for the day and confronting him, but whenever I tried to make the decision, my resolve faltered at the consequences of confronting him. It felt like I was making a decision to end things. The truth of the matter was, I didn't want to end things with Derek. But normal, sane men would say that in this case it didn't matter what I wanted. What mattered would be what I needed to do. Sane men would end things with a cheating spouse, wouldn't they? What was left that still tied me to him? What was it that made me draw out this betrayal and want to know more about it? Love? Or madness? 

Eventually, I found myself in the very same corner of the university when my marriage first fell apart. Once again I was alone and surrounded by an eerie quiet that once helped calm me, but now seemed stifling. There was no lecture or the clacking of keyboards to distract me from my own thoughts, or desires to overwhelm and blind me. I had spent the past 40 minutes staring at a blank word document, my fingers itching to reach for the keyboard to go to the one place I both dreaded and sinfully desired to go. My next class wasn't for another hour and a half. I was alone in a corner of the school that saw very little foot traffic, especially this late in the day. Drumming my fingers on the table one more time, I mustered enough determination to delve deeper into my husband's mystery life. 

I quickly scrolled down and found myself in the last entry that I had watched, the memory of it bittersweet in my mind, confused by the arousal of the act coupled by the sadness and frustration of the infidelity. The next entry was a combined post of a picture and a video. The picture was of Jack and Derek, naked but for their underwear, sitting on a sofa arm in arm. It was captioned "Post scene chat". They were both smiling, but I recognized Derek's smile. It was Derek's shy smile. The ones he gave when something embarrassed him but happy and not at all minding that it had. It was the smile that he gave me and the pack when we threw him a surprise party. A difficult feat to pull off for a Werewolf, but something we did successfully. 

I clicked to the video, plugged in my earphones, and took a look around one more time before hitting play. 

The odd, dull, static of an empty room with very minimal sound greeted my ears before it was broken by a laugh off screen. It was Derek's laugh. His real laugh. His easy, comfortable laugh. I could recognize it anywhere. Jack sat on the couch, his bare, hairy torso and colourful tattoos on display to the camera.

"Come here and sit down." Jack ordered jovially in a deep, gravely voice. 

"What?" I heard a faint voice ask distantly in the background. 

"Boy, come here. This is for you page. Talk to your audience." He said, lifting his left arm for someone off camera. Slowly, I see Derek move into frame and take a seat next to him. He was clothed, wearing a grey short sleeved Henley that I had bought him on a whim one weekend. "Take that off."

Derek smiled crookedly, a little bit awkwardly, but complied as Jack helped lift the shirt of my husband's body. Then in a smooth motion, grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him into a deep, passionate kiss. I saw Derek stiffen at first, but Jack had a hold on Derek's neck, holding him in place. But seconds later, I saw Derek begin to relax and lean into the kiss. The camera was close enough that I could see their tongues dance into each other's mouth. I could see small strings of saliva connect their lips and their tongues whenever they briefly pulled away. Jack's hand traveled down my husband's torso and began to play with Derek's left nipple. Derek groaned at the touch and leaned deeper into the kiss before Jack abruptly pulled back with a laugh and faced the camera. For a moment, Derek looked nonplussed, his face flushed from the kiss. 

"So for those who don't know, I'm Jack Dixon and this here's Derek, a.k.a. SourWolf88." Jack declared to the camera. "He just finished his first massage and blowjob video. So, how'd you like it, son?"

Derek glanced at the camera for a moment before leveling his facial expression to one I was familiar with. It was defensive and reserved. "Good."

The answer was abrupt, and clearly something that Jack didn't approve. "Come on now, use your words. This is you channel. Connect with your audience. You did say you needed this."

Derek thought for a moment, looked away from the camera and stared into the distance for a few seconds before turning back. "It was good. Different. Very different."

"How do you mean?" Jack asked.

"I've never... done that before." Derek qualified. "The massage."

"You were moaning pretty loud. I gotta say, you must've been holding in a lot of stress. You've got a lot of tension in your shoulders, man. You were pretty tight all over." Jack explained, his body half turned in Derek's direction, making sure to look Derek in the eyes as he talked. 

Derek kept glancing away at random moments, before inevitably turning back to look at the other man as well. "Yeah. Stress. You know." 

"I could tell. You came a lot though. Must've been a lot of pent up stuff there." Jack laughed.

Derek blushed but gave a small laugh too. "A bit , yeah. I guess."

"I'm serious man. You almost drowned me back there. Never had so much spunk in my mouth. You're a producer, that's what you are."

"You're one to talk." Derek pointed out devilishly, a cheeky response that I never expected from him. "I had a hard time taking all of that in. I didn't know we were going to do that."

The sudden shift from monosyllabic words to complete sentences was jarring for me. Derek himself seemed to have been caught off guard, glancing at the camera again before visibly pulling his emotions back and hunched into the sofa. 

Jack started laughing out loud, leaning back with ease and posed his hands behind his head, looking up at a ceiling as if he were lost in thought, completely unaware, or didn't care, about Derek's shift in mood. "Yeah, I got caught up in the moment. But you didn't say no and I didn't hear you complaining." 

"No. I didn't." Derek confirmed a little quietly, running his thumb along his lower lip, his eyes seemingly lost in thought as well. 

Jack suddenly became a little more animated, leaning forward once again to face the camera with a wide, toothy, smile that was almost lost behind his thick beard. It pulled Derek's attention back into the moment and he looks on with curiosity as Jack addressed the audience. "I gotta tell you, the first time he did that the boy gagged for a second before he started downing it like motherfucking water, I tell you what." 

"Oh jeez," Derek muttered, blushing deeper before turning away from the camera and wincing to the side. 

"No, it's a funny story." Jack insisted, patting Derek on the chest warmly before turning back to the camera. For a moment I saw Derek reach for his hand, and missed it by a second before ending up caressing the spot where Jack's hand had touched him. "See, Derek boy here isn't used to swallowing apparently. It was me and Aarin, you know Aarin Asker, and we were having a time. See Derek hasn't been with no other man 'cept his husband, and that ain't amounting to much in terms of experience. You know?"

I flinched at the Jack's description. I had always prided myself for my sexual prowess and imaginative mind. I thought I pushed Derek pretty far when it came to experimenting with sexual positions and stuff. Sure, all of those were things that I just read about online when I used to do that type of research, but we did end up doing some stuff. From the sound of things though, it either wasn't enough, or wasn't right. 

"Now he says the guy is good, and I ain't go issue with that." Jack clarified when he noticed Derek's frowning face when he started talking about me. "No issue at all. But when this guy got a whiff of us, man it was like he was possessed by an animal. He went and started licking and rubbing up on our pits and our balls. He sucked on our balls like a thirsty man in the desert. Right, kid?"

Derek smirked and confessed slowly, "I liked your musk."

"Damn right you did." Jack laughed before continuing. "It didn't take long before you seemed to man up and go to town on our dicks. The first time I came in his mouth, it happened cause he wouldn't fucking let go. I wanted to just cum on his face or his chest or wherever, ease him into it you know? But the fucker wouldn't fucking let go. He was hoovering this dick down like there was no tomorrow. Guy started chocking when I let go, spluttered a bit and event spat up some. But he didn't let that hold him back. He lapped up what dribbled out and went right back to sucking me off till I was drained clean." 

"It was good." Derek explained to the camera, as if he was willing the audience listening to understand his side of the story. "I couldn't help it. It was... liberating."

"You didn't seem like the type that needed liberating. Guy looking like you, married to a guy no less, it was hard to believe you hadn't done more. Why was that?" Jack asked curiously. "You look like sex on stick. Fuck, you could blink at anyone and they'd jump into bed with you."

Derek thought of his answer for a few seconds before turning back to Jack. "There wasn't really time. Until recently, anyway. There was always something to worry about. But when you've got nothing else to do, you start seeing what you want to do."

"Well it was obvious you wanted to do it. We couldn't get you to stop even if we wanted to!" Jack laughed. 

"I'll confess, I just needed the money at first. But when you messaged me and we got to talking, something in me just wanted to know more. And when we were together, with the way you guys look, smell, and made me feel, something just clicked. I was pretty embarrassed."

"Why's that?" Jack asked curiously. 

"I thought I made myself look desperate. I didn't really know what I was doing. It's different with my husband. It was _really_ different with you guys." Derek said calmly before he smiled widely. "But you guys weren't really complaining." 

"Fuck, you sucked off Aarin after that. Then me a few more times, and back and forth. I lost track actually. How many loads between the two of us did you eat that night?" Jack asked.

"Seven. Four off you and three off Aarin." Derek slowly closed his eyes then before he started touching his body. "You two smelled like sex. You all smelled like you two hadn't showered for a day, at least. Your dicks were hot in my mouth, soft and hard on my tongue. I could taste you, _all_ of you. The deeper I took you in, the more of you I could smell and I just kept wanting more. You guys came a lot. Thick too. I took you in too deep at first, so the cum would just shoot down my throat. But I liked the taste of it, of what I could manage."

"That's right. You looked like you were having a hell of a time." Jack reminisced. "Started begging us to just cum in you mouth 'cause you wanted to taste it." 

"Yes." Derek confirmed, his eyes still closed, his hands now exploring his body and his hardening crotch. "I remember realizing that I really liked it, that I probably couldn't get enough of it. I liked both of you filling my mouth. I liked playing with the cum in my mouth before swallowing it." 

"Yeah, you want more boy?" Jack suddenly asked in a deeper voice, moving to stand in front of the camera beside Derek. 

Derek opens his eyes at the question and looked up at Jack only for a moment before moving kneel down in front of the hairy man. 

"Fuck yeah," Jack grumbled as he started playing with his nipples in one hand, and jacking off with the other. He was looking down at Derek with lust, pumping his cock inches from the gaping mouth of my husband. Derek was looking up at him with a desire I had not seen for a very, very, long time. "Here it is boy. Eat daddy's cum." 

The scene was much closer this time, and the camera took it all much clearer than before. Thick, white, streams of cum shot out of Jack's bulbous cock head and into Derek's open mouth, my husband's hand masturbating his own cock furiously. Five, long, thick streams shot out before it became a dribble. When it did, Derek dove forward and suckled on the head once more and I watched as my husband's throat began to pulse. I heard him moan loudly as he drank down the older man's spunk, taking more of Jack's cock into his mouth, swallowing everything the older man was willing to give him. 

Then in another smooth motion, Jack pulled Derek up on his feet and lunged down to take my husband's tool in his mouth. His head bobbed quickly, his cheeks sinking in, sucking the fat tool deep and fast into his orifice. In little time the muscles in Derek's thighs began to dance and his buttocks started to twerk as he released his seed into the eager man's mouth. I could see that Jack couldn't take it all as a small stream started to dribble down from the corners of his mouth. He quickly detached and stood up with full, bulging cheeks. I could see that Derek wasn't finished cumming as there was a quick shot of stream after stream still leaving his dick before he was kneeling down again, his leaking dick no longer in frame. Jack gripped the side of Derek's cheek and my husband opened his mouth in response. Then in one of the most obscene and sexiest scenes I had ever seen, he began to fill my husband's mouth with his own seed. 

Derek moaned lustfully, his body still convulsing from his own orgasm, as Jack spat everything in his mouth into Derek's before leaning down and exchanging obscenely wet kisses. I could see strings of cum stretch and dribbled down the corner of their mouths, but Derek would quickly dart his tongue out to catch the stray stream until the two looked a mess of cum, sweat, and spit. I watched Derek's heaving chest slow down as the kisses on the screen became more tender before fading into black. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter felt a bit too "telling now showing", if you know what I mean. But I figured, OnlyFans was a decent way of moving the story along in this case. Make it kinda like Derek's version of a Big Brother confessional booth. Instead of, you know, building it up chapter after chapter a little at a time, and if/when Derek's motivation is revealed, it means less than what had already happened in the story. Or something like that. If that made sense. This is basically about Stiles getting cucked and him articulating his own feelings on the subject and what he wants out of his marriage with Derek. So I'm using Derek as a tool to move Stiles along in sorting out his frazzled mind and desires. 
> 
> Also, I like uncharacteristically slutty and porny Derek. Sue me. I'll be adding more uncharacteristically slutty Derek moments even if it doesn't make sense to the plot danggit! >.<


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles manages to find resolve through his muddled thoughts just as he finds more videos of Derek. One in particular twists the knife of his husband's betrayal even deeper than it already had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Long chapter. Again, be aware that it's poorly edited (as in, not at all). So be wary of that.

What little revelations I gained from that video were more than I could have hoped for. Derek was never the kind of man who expressed his feelings into words. He had always relied on actions to get his point across. This had been a source of frustration on my part for years. I couldn't help but think back at all the times our supernatural problems could have been avoided if Derek had learned to let people in. If he had learned how to trust a little bit earlier on. If he had learned to rely on people who had the best of intentions. Instead our past were riddled with fumbling mistakes that could easily have been avoided with the right words. 

Is that why he had turned to using his body in this manner? He did confess that it was a way to make money, at least at first, but it had developed into something more. Technically he was still using fist and bone to break through whatever issues he was facing, and leaving me out of it for some reason. In that way, I suppose he was still my Derek. But instead of inflicting pain, he was using his body for pleasure. I could only wish he had turned to me for that, instead of to strangers in the dark. 

Another voice in my head pulled me back from the precipice of fully empathising with my cheating husband. Having a glimpse at what his motivations might have been was one matter, the fact that he acted in such a way that betrayed me was completely something else. I didn't understand the fact that apparently my existence was acknowledged in this video, if not my identity, yet I saw no acknowledgment that he was _cheating_ on me. There was no regret in this particular confession, only proclamations of relief from having an epiphany.

I checked the time and found that I at least had another hour until the start of my next class. I still had enough time to search through Derek's feed to piece together his motivations. I was driven now. I decided that I needed to understand. After that confession, I found it easier to watch my husband's indiscretions if it meant understanding them. Although it frustrated me that I had to rely on a video to even begin to understand my husband's infidelity. 

But considering the sheer length of time this had been happening, I didn't even know where to begin. Should I continue and follow the entries in the order they were uploaded? That didn't seem practical. I started prowling through site, trying to find a better way to filter the entries. The dedicated video page for the users didn't help as it only displayed the video thumbnails and didn't show the abstract. It would be difficult to pinpoint which ones could provide more insight as the one that I had just watched with Jack and Derek. They could just very well be more mindless fuck scenes. It took me about ten minutes going back and forth to find that stupid magnifying glass icon that allowed me to search through Derek's uploads. I already knew what I wanted to search for. I had seen enough Youtube videos that people who made these types videos would likely have them, particularly those who were conscientious enough to have a post-scene interview. 

Just as I thought, "Q & A" pulled up two entries, six months apart from each other, with the most recent being just a few weeks ago. I played the one that was filmed about five months into our move. It was just captioned with a simple "Q & A, I answer your most asked questions. At least the ones I want to."

The video was about twenty-five minutes long, the longest one that I had every seen him upload... thus far. It seemed astonishing to me that Derek would be willing to sit down and actually _talk_ for twenty-five minutes. 

The scene started with him in familiar surroundings. He was sitting in front of his PC, our bed was clear and neatly made up in the background. Witnessing a bit of Derek's meticulous behaviour, an obsession with cleanliness rather, was at least a welcome sight. He was dressed in one of his Henley's and jeans, another comforting and familiar image. 

"Right. I think this is recording this time. I see the little red light thing." He said while squinting somewhere at the top of the screen before studying something in the monitor. "Yep, it's working. Alright. So some of you have been asking for a little Q & A and, well, here it is."

He said awkwardly while running a hand into his hair before fidgeting in his seat. He moved the mouse on the screen before continuing. 

"Okay, so I just grabbed a bunch of the most commonly asked questions from my posts and I'll try to answer them. Try. Because I might not want to or get sick of trying." He said with a strained, toothy, forced smile. I couldn't help but chuckle at the scene, being so familiar with this side of Derek's personality; when he's forced to do something he doesn't want to do, but knows he has to do it. 

"First question: What got you into starting an OnlyFans page?" Derek asked. "Simple: Money. Next question."

I rolled my eyes at his response. It was expected, but I'm sure the questioner likely wanted more. I watched as he was about to ask the next question before he turned to read something else intensely on the screen. 

"What? That's not enough? Well, I dunno." He huffed out a breathe in frustration at what he had just read. "I guess... umm..."

It was then I saw the date and time stamp on the entry. It must have been streamed live. I guess he had been reading someone's comment to his response. 

"We needed money. We had just moved here, away from... family. We didn't have much. I didn't have much. I needed to take care of him, and I wasn't doing a good job of it." He explained, surprisingly honest. "What jobs I _did_ get wasn't enough. There was this guy at the site, I used to work in construction, that used to joke about quitting and starting an OnlyFans. That's where I got the idea. I researched it a bit and, well... here we are. Next question."

"Are you really married?" He said before raising his hand to showcase our wedding band. "Yes."

His eyes darted back to, what must have been, the chat screen as if he was reading something else.

"Nope. None of your business." He insisted before continuing on to read the next of his chosen list. "Are you really gay?"

Derek inhaled deeply before turning to the camera to answer the question. 

"No, I'm not. I've been with men, women, bi, trans, and everything else." He explained. "But... yeah, I do have a type. Especially recently."

His eyes darted back to the chat screen and read out loud a follow up question. 

"My type right now is, I guess hyper masculine guys. I know, I'm being a stereotype. But that's where I am right now." 

Despite myself, I occasionally caught myself listening to Derek's answers out of pure curiosity, not as a spurned husband. Considering the numerous comments under the video, I was not the only curious viewer. 

But as the video went along, the more it felt like Derek had moved away from me. Months into our marriage, and already my husband was confessing things to a secret porn account that I was totally ignorant of, from the taboo to the mundane. 

Favourite food? I thought it was Italian, but he said that it was Greek. 

Favourite colour? I thought it was black (considering his wardrobe), but his response was burgundy.

Major pet peeve? My answer was messy people. Apparently it's people who "don't know when to shut up and just live in the moment".

To my credit, there were things that I got right. There were also things that I knew the answer of, by Derek either chose to vaguely answer or ignore altogether. Unfortunately, he never answered nor entertain any questions about his infidelity, or if his husband was aware of them. But reading into the comments, it sounded like everyone was just taking things in stride, assuming that I had sanctioned Derek's sexual indiscretions. 

_Gays don't do monogamy_. _Leave that to the straights_. One commenter wrote. 

_His husband probably sleeps around too_. Another said.

_Probably not married_. _Just wearing that ring so people don't bother him_. _Well, it's not gonna work honey_. _HAH-KNEE_. _No_. _I'm going to stalk you anyway_. Another quipped. 

Those were among the kinder ones. There were many conversations who referred to me as a cuck instead. 

_Prolly a skinny twink that knows he can't handle a man like our SourWolf, so gave up and leaves him to his own devices just so he can occasionally get some of that ass_. Wrote one. 

I couldn't deny it. For all intents and purposes, that's what I was. I was the ignorant spouse left in the dark by a cheating husband. No, I was worse. I found out about the affair, and instead of the succumbing to the pain and the anger, I've resolved to delve deeper into his infidelity. It all kept coming back to the question, 'what did I want'? 

Derek's infidelity was undeniable. My anger was real. My pain was real and... it mattered. So why was I still here? 

I paused the video at a part where Derek was about to confess his favourite animal (not wolves, but pandas - not to eat, but to cuddle. He's adorably embarrassed by this fact.)

I took the time to ask myself an important question: Do I still love Derek? 

All the voices in my head said; yes. 

Should I leave Derek? 

Most voices in my head said ; yes. 

Do I want to leave Derek? 

Half of the voices said; yes. 

Do I still think he's worth loving despite this betrayal? 

I said; yes.

Do I _want_ to still love him? 

I couldn't answer. It was getting painful to even want to try. But was all of these worth it? Does finding out Derek's motivations really change the fact that he cheated on me, and continues to? I stood up and moved around again, trying to force my brain to think of things in a different perspective. 

I was the jilted lover, there was no question. I _had_ a right to all of my pain. But what if it had been someone else? What would I say to Scott if Allison had cheated on him? To Lydia if Jackson had cheated on him? To Erica, if each boy-of-the week had cheated on her? 

I would be their friend. I would tell them that they needed to care for their own self interests instead of worrying about their cheating partners. That they deserved better. I would insist upon it, even if they tried to qualify or to cop onto some of the blame. I would point out the fact that they shouldn't turn another person's mistake as a indictment of their own character. I would point out that they didn't cheat. I would point out that they were better than that. I would point out that they were worth better, that I believed they were worth more even if they thought of themselves as worth less. I would be their friend. 

So, why wasn't I doing that to myself? Why taking all this time and looking for possible excuses. It doesn't change things that I was hurt. I was in pain. I didn't feel good. Beyond the arousal of the act, there was incomparable pain from the betrayal. 

Why was I finding it so difficult to be my own friend? 

My mind felt heavy and muddled, and I was exhausted from being in so much pain. I sat back down as my thoughts began to coalesce into something more substantial. These thoughts inevitable narrowed down or was shaped into the most basic thing; pain. Loving him was painful. Trying to sort my pain was painful. I was confused at being hurt, being left out, and for that little part of me that... liked it. All of this was painful. If I were my friend, would I want myself to wallow in this pain? 

I dropped my arms listlessly on the table, as if the weight of my emotions had finally taken a toll at any will to prop myself up. In the process, I accidentally dropped the on the laptop, causing the page to refresh. 

When the page stopped loading, it had moved to my account's front feed. To my surprise, it displayed a new video from Brody that pulled my attention. The thumbnail this time featured Derek's back in full display, the triskelion tattoo on his back was clear for all to see. He was only wearing a familiar jockstrap similar to the one I had seen him in this morning. With some trepidation, I clicked play on the 5 minute clip that was titled, "Fun with SourWolf while on a call". 

The video started with a close up of Derek and Brody kissing. Derek had his eyes closed, his hands on Brody's neck, his thumb caressing the other man's jaw tenderly. Brody had his eyes open, peeking to the side at the camera while both of his hands were cupping Derek's ass cheeks. Someone else was filming, and this person was moving around while encouraging the scene before him. 

"Just two bros making out. Yeah, just two bros kissing! Bros be bro-ing out, yeah!" The one holding the camera sang in a false falsetto before laughing.

'"Stick you finger up his ass!" Another voice called out from somewhere else. 

Derek's right hand then began to travel down Brody's muscular body, caressing the large shoulders and biceps before making his way down the jock's muscular pecs towards his swollen cock. It was erect, the cock head flushed red and oozing a white liquid that rolled down a thick, white shaft. Brody smiled cockily at the camera, briefly turning to face it and stuck his tongue out as Derek began to grip and jack his cock. Brody began to move forward, pushing Derek back until he hit the front of a stove with Super Mario towels, bumping into someone who was cooking. 

My spine tingled and my muscles froze as soon as the familiar towels came into view. Those were my towels. That was my oven. That was my countertop. This was my kitchen. I was watching my husband fondling that asshole Brody in my own kitchen. There were strangers in my own home. There was a stranger cooking in my mother fucking kitchen! My hand moved on its own and paused the video. I stood up and once more began pacing the empty space, a habit I noticed I had recently developed. At least I was getting my walks in through all of this, a random part of my brain noted. 

I was angry. I was furious. 

Or was I?

I was clearly aroused. Even before I had realized it was our home, my cock had gotten hard at watching my husband make out with Brody. Hell, it was still hard. But how could he do it in our den? 

I stood with my back against a window pain, letting the cool glass temper the rising heat of my body. I closed my eyes and thought of trees. I then held the picture in my mind and looked for branches and painted images of leaves. I counted each leaf in my brain, slowly and deliberately. I created a form, pictured a piece, a counted all other pieces. This was something that I had been taught when I was younger to help calm my mind. I used to use it when even the Adderall wasn't enough.

Think of trees. Look for branches. Paint some leaves. Count them. Think of more trees. Find more branches. Paint more leaves. Count them. Think. Look. Paint. Count. On and on until my heart no longer threatened to beat out of my chest and the ringing in my ears had stopped. 

It wasn't always this easy. It hasn't been. I haven't had to resort in this for a long time, but still grateful that it worked now. It gave me time and a little bit of distance from what I had just seen. What did I just see? My husband cheating on me in _our_ den that seemed to be full of strangers. My husband wearing the same jockstrap I had seen him in when he came home this morning. Wearing it, and only it, while kissing a man who I may not like but certainly lusted after. 

What did I feel now? I felt aroused. I felt angry. I felt curious. I felt furious. I felt a thousand other things that contradicted and negated another thousand more. These were feelings on top of feelings until... what was left behind? Resignation? That curiosity? I stared at that little machine on the table for some time, the window into my husband's infidelity. I had seen too much... known too much... yet resolved too little and I think...

I think. I just think I wanted to see. I needed to see. 

I went back to my seat, opened the laptop after a deep breath and played the video once more. 

"I'm supposed to be cooking for my husband." Derek laughed through the kisses. The two of them moved around once more, showing more of our kitchen and the things cooking in the background. The other stranger cooking was a tall blond with short cropped hair, and incredibly muscular and smooth. He was frying something in a pan while smiling easily at the two people necking in front of him. 

"Uh, huh." Brody smirked before deepening the kiss. I watched as Brody stuck his tongue into Derek's mouth, and as Derek licked and lap and suckled at the pink flesh, sucking it into his own mouth. 

"Fuck him!" The one holding the camera yelled. 

A phone then began to ring in the background. 

"Fuck. That's him." Derek said after another deep kiss before taking a step back. He turned to grab his cell on the counter, yet kept holding onto Brody's hard cock with the other. 

It only rang the one more time before he answered. "Hey babe. How're you?"

His words went through me like thunder, shocking my system into paralysis for a moment. I stared at the monitor quietly, frozen in place by a madness that wanted me to keep watching. 

"Stiles, you alright?" Derek asked quizzically, and for a moment I thought the Derek in the video was talking to me. But I watched him slowly stroking Brody's cock, caressing the shaft lovingly like he used to do with mine. 

Derek seemed to listen to a question over the phone, while the other men began to shake their bodies with silent laughter, exaggeratedly motioning each other to remain silent. But from the video, I could still hear the camera person quietly chuckling to himself. 

"Sorry to hear that. You coming home soon?" He asked nonchalantly before Brody pushed him against the counter and forcibly bent him over. Derek's phone hand moved away from his face before he even finished the sentence, having to catch himself from toppling over as Brad moved behind him. Derek's other hand end up catching on the drying rack, causing the dishes to rattle. The blond man cooking threw a hand to cover his mouth, muffling an exclamation of surprise. 

"Well, just to let you know I'm making that pasta you like." Derek says as the camera moves to his other side. From this angle the video captures Brody shoving his thick fingers into my husband while he talked to me over the phone. "Just heat it up in the microwave when you get home." 

I watched as the blond man quickly shifts his attention back on the food he was cooking, realising that he had almost let it burn. The pan sizzles loudly as he began to stir its contents. 

Brody then aims his cock at Derek's hole, spreading my husband's muscular mounds aside while teasing at the entrance with his cock head. Derek chuckles at the sensation and perks his but up as the food sizzles again. "Of course. It's what loving husbands do."

"Fucking hot." The man holding the camera whispers, and I can even see he had pulled out his own cock out and was stroking it as he watched Brody slowly sink his thick member into my husband's willing hole. 

Brody moves his mouth close to Derek's other ear and begins whispering something that could not be heard. But the video provided captions that could be read. 

_Want me to fuck you while your husband is on the phone_? _You want this cock breeding you while_? 

"Of course. You know I do." He said quickly, nodding his head empathically before jutting out his ass further back into Brody's pelvis. A small huff of laughter escapes his mouth as the large member sinks into him. 

"I _miss_ you and I love you. We really need to stop talking like this..." Derek manages to say evenly as Brody begins to fuck him with an even pace. He draws back all the way to the tip before slowly shoving his hard member back into my husband's twitching orifice. A little part of my brain noticed that they were doing this raw. 

Brody whispers quietly which was once again subtitled on camera. "You love this cock?"

Derek nods as lustfully, his eyes rolling back at each thrust. Occasionally he would try to bite his lip to hold the lustful moans that threatened to escape his mouth. 

"Yeah." He said in response to Brody's question. 

"Keep talking to him." Brody whispers in his ear again. 

Derek nods and asks, "when are you gonna be on leave sailor?"

Brody then starts picking up the pace, and slowly but surely the slapping of skin as the jock starts fucking my husband hard gets louder. 

"Okay. Well, I gotta finish cooking and clean up before heading out for work." Derek says quickly as he increasingly struggled to keep his voice even on the phone. 

"Hey, wake me up when you get in tomorrow." Derek says as he bends over the counter even more to give Brody easier access to his muscular ass. "Doesn't matter what time, I want to see you before you head out for your afternoon classes." 

Derek for a moment moves the camera away form his mouth as a quietly moaned " _fuck_ " escaped from his lips. 

"Fuck me, please. Breed my ass." He begs to Brody behind him before moving the phone back to his ear . "Sounds good. I love you babe." 

Then just as he finished saying the words, Derek hangs up and quickly throws the phone aside, moaning even louder once the call ended. 

Laughter erupts in the room as the camera shakes due to the camera man's laughter. Brody laughs too, harshly and cockily, throwing the camera a shaka sign with one hand while sticking his tongue out. He then pulls Derek's body back before pushing his head and torso down while keeping Derek's ass up, essentially pile driving him on kitchen floor. 

It wasn't long before Brody throws his head up and grunts forcefully before exclaiming, "yeah, take that you fucking whore!" 

Brody's legs rattle as he empties his seed into my husband's anal cavity, now almost doubled over atop the bent over shape of my husband on our kitchen floor. 

"Fuck, I'm almost there!" The camera man exclaims before moving over to push Brody to the side and points his camera downwards, filming himself jack his cock over Derek's hole. 

It looked obscene. Derek's anus looked worn and wet, pulsing from the beating it had just gotten. The camera recorded every satisfied moan escaping from my mate's mouth. 

"Fuck, I love breeding this ass." The camera man exclaims before a thick line of come shoots out of his cock. But before another could exclaim, he shoves his entire, unlubricated dick into my husband's cum soaked, pulsing, spent hole. Derek's moans louder as the man breeds my husband with his seed. 

Off camera, the blond man just laughed while cooking my evening meal. 

A long moment passed before I could feel anything again. 

Not carrying about missing my evening class, I packed my bags calmly as my entire being was possessed by a single, sincere, focused thought. The first thought that formed in my brain was a promise to be a better friend to myself. 

In the silence of the night, I made my way home. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is the confrontation with Derek. 
> 
> Also, I seriously thing there there were a bunch of grammatical, spelling, and logical mistakes in there. Crap. Oh well. *sings 'let it go'*


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles thinks of the good times as he makes his way back home to confront his mate. Before it happens, he is pushed off that final ledge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think some people are going to hate this chapter for different reasons. 1.) What happens, 2.) The potentially confusing style.
> 
> Once again, unedited (sorry) so point out any mistakes. This chapter jumps back and forth between Stiles travelling to the loft and his memories of times past. Took me longer to post this chapter cause I wasn't sure if the transitions were clear enough... I hope they are and you guys understand the different memories playing out. Otherwise, I might have to just do things the easier way and edit this chapter with scene separations of past vs present. But I wanted to try something new...

Derek was the one who asked me to marry him. Not in the human way, mind you. He wanted to do something, as he described, 'more meaningful and lasting than a human marriage'. The lonely walk back to my car felt far longer than it probably was. I couldn't help but think back and wonder if I had done the right thing in tying myself down to a Were, _this_ Were, so young. I wish it hadn't been so happy back then. It would have been easier to let go. 

"Are you sure about this?" I remember Scott asking in my bedroom before the ceremony. 

"Dude, you're his best man. Should you really be asking that question?" I said, amused at my best friend. "How about, 'you can do it'. Or 'go get 'em bro'!"

"I really can't be your best man?" He asked, sounding disappointed before adding, "don't tell Derek I said that." 

"He didn't really have a lot of options. Who else, Liam or Peter?" Lydia pointed out. "That's why _I_ get to be his best person." 

"The best ever." I said with a wink.

"Besides, Cora turned him down." She moves in front of me with a sigh before gripping both of my shoulders tightly with her hands. "But he does have a point. Just say the word and I drive the getaway car." 

I pretended to consider for a moment before laughing it off. "Yeah, I'm good. Besides it's just a Werewolf wedding. I'm technically and legally not married, you know."

Even at that time, despite saying the words, I wasn't sure if I had believed them. 

"Pretty sure Werewolf married is still married dude." Scott had insisted. 

"Yeah, but not really." I said manically, throwing my hands in the air. "We _could_ have a human wedding, but instead I'm running out into the forest in the middle of the night in a suit. These pants don't breathe well. It's going to chafe!" 

"Well if you did it traditionally, you'd be wearing clothes sown from deer skin you had hunted and tanned yourself after having covered your body in its blood. Yes, running in dress shoes suck but at least nowadays you get to wear them." She pointed out. 

"Fair point." I admitted before shaking my body to try and rid it of the butterflies in my belly. "Where's my dad anyway?" 

"He's been with Derek since last night. Father-in-Law and Son-in-Law bonding time, apparently." Scott said before his phone buzzed. "Oh, never mind. They're here. So I gotta go."

He walked towards me with that crooked and goofy little smile of his before pulling me into a tight hug. I returned the gesture and put as much meaning into my touch as I possibly could. 

I could feel him smiling into my neck and whispered, "I know. I love you too buddy." 

When he had left, Lydia was still staring at me oddly, head tilted to the side and drumming her perfectly manicured nails on her sharp chin.

"What?" I asked nervously. 

She was quiet for a few moments, her eyes searching my face intently, before shrugging something off like I had just done and plastered a happy smile on her face. "Nothing. Let's get you ready. You've guy a mating trail to run." 

I couldn't help but wonder now if the butterflies I had felt at that time was something more. Maybe it was a supernatural warning about a big mistake? Maybe Lydia had seen something with her... Banshee-ness, or whatever? I never really fully understood how that worked, even to this day. But, even at that time the butterflies eventually went away. I stopped thinking about them for the most part when I starting the mating run, relishing in the feeling of the wind on my sweat slicked skin as I ran through those dark woods. I remember laughing out loud as my prospective Werewolf husband caught me with a laugh, lifting my whole body in the air in one, fell, swoop and swinging me around. I laughed with him, my heart pounding at my chest and booming like war drums in my ears. 

" _Mine_." He had said, his eyes glowing blue in the moonlight, before sinking his teeth on my skin to mark me as such. 

I touched the mark now, as I drove home. There were little crescent shaped bumps at the base of my neck. I thought of them as little love marks before. Now I couldn't think of them as anything else but crescent shaped scars on my skin.

"Surprise!" I remember my dad screaming as I was dragged outside a few days after we announced Derek and I would be moving to Oakland. He stood in front of a yellow Subaru Impreza. 

"Okay?" I had asked, confused. "Hate to tell you this dad, but this is a step down from the impala. Weird thing for the Sheriff to drive." 

He gave me that patented Stilinski frustrated-dad look before sniping back, "it's for you, wise guy. Because someone obliterated his car by ramming it into bigfoot."

"Giant. It was a giant. Way less hair." I corrected. "You couldn't find a jeep?"

Another Stilinski-look leveled my way and I quickly doubled back and threw my hands up in the air in celebration. "Just kidding, this is awesome! Thanks pops!" 

"Uh huh." He just said before pulling me into a tight hug. "Take care of yourself, okay kid?" 

"Don't I usually?" I objected. 

"Not really." Derek interrupted, moving to join us in the lawn. 

My dad let go and moved towards Derek, giving him a fond look that warmed my heart before extending his hands. "You too, Derek." 

"I will." Derek replied with a small smile, gripping my father's hand into his. 

"Okay, you guys can do all of this while I get into that." I said happily before jumping forward to grab the keys from my father's hand. I happily got into the ugly little car and fiddle with as many buttons and knobs as I could. In the rear view mirror, I smiled as I saw my father and Derek hugging tightly, their faces buried in each other's necks. 

It was never a difficult choice for me to leave home at that time for two reasons. I always knew that I would eventually be back, for one, and that I would be welcomed back with open arms. The second was that I always thought that I would have Derek by my side. I always thought that despite my misgivings about Werewolf mating traditions, that we _were_ a married couple. We were mates. I believed that despite the fact that there was no signature in a government office, that we shared a deeper and more primal bond. That we shared a promise that was signed in sweat and blood. And dancing. 

"What's going on?" I remember asking after the mating ceremony as I was led around by the arm, my eyes covered in cloth. 

"We're almost there." Lydia said reassuringly before stopping. "There's a chair just a little bit to your left. You're almost there. Now just sit down and enjoy."

"Enjoy what?" I asked excitedly before someone had removed the blinds. 

In front of me, in a coordinated row were my friends and family. Lydia quickly joined them in their curiously arranged line. The few guests invited to the reception were gathered around us in a loose circle, watching the entire thing with smiles. Derek stood at the front of the pack, only wearing his white button up with his sleeves rolled up. Most of the men, and Cora and somehow also Liam, were dressed the same, with their jackets off and their sleeves rolled up. Cora, Melissa, still wore their ceremony dresses, while Lydia had somehow managed a wardrobe change into a scarlet strapless dress. 

"I'm only doing this one. So you better remember everything." Derek said with a mischievous smile before nodding at a guest in the corner.

"Remember what?" I asked excitedly, which quickly hit its peak when the music started playing. 

_Everybody_. The track sounded as in unison my friends and family took a pose with a quick movement of their hands. 

"Oh my god." I gaped. 

_Rock your body_. The track sounded again, the music getting louder.

"Oh my god. Ohmygod. Ohmygodohmygodohmygod." I muttered in a rushed mantra. 

_Everybody_ , _rock your body right_. The music sang as my pack began to bob their heads along the music. _Backstreet's back_. _Alright_!

"Yes!" I suddenly exclaimed, both hands in the air as I watched in pure bliss as Werewolves danced to the Backstreet Boys.

I laughed and cheered as they danced to the rhythm, even copying the exact moves from the video. Their faces were a mixture of glee, concentration, and even some frustration as they danced along all for the sake of me and my husband. Liam looked like he wanted to just disappear, but a quick slap at the back of the head from Malia quickly got him dancing a bit more enthusiastically, pulling a laugh from my lips. Melissa was laughing wildly, dancing freely and with gusto. My dad's face was crumpled with concentration, trying to match the dance steps in his memories with his awkward body. Lydia was astonishingly graceful, her long hair whipping back and forth in the wind, highlighting her perfect rhythm. Scott - had given up about 30 seconds in and was just dancing wildly like a maniac as Kira kept trying to lead him back into formation. Cora was surprisingly graceful and seemed to have decided to compete with Lydia. 

The sheer amount of coordination and preparation needed to be able to do an entire dance number was astonishing to me. Especially considering that, realistically, our wasn't well known for its planning skills. 

"Ugh. How tacky." Peter had said, popping up out of nowhere as I danced in place.

"It's awesome!" I exclaimed and tried to match a dance turn to abject failure. Instead I accidentally slapped Peter in the face with the back of my hand in the process. 

I should have danced more. I should have danced until my legs had given out. I should have danced until there was nothing but the music, my lack of rhythm, and the sheer effort being made by my bones. 

"No regrets?" He had asked my shyly the night after our reception in our dimly lit den. We were lying down naked on our side, facing each other, while he slowly stroked my hair with his large hands. 

I managed to shake my head despite the position, looking into his face. The corner of his eyes crinkled when he smiled. "You?"

"No." He said simply before leaning over for a soft kiss. "Thank you."

"For what?" I had asked, exhausted from the busy night. 

"For making the promise with me." He whispered in the dark as my vision began to fade. 

"Promise?" I repeated quietly. 

"To love me, no matter what." He whispered close to my face, his breathe tickling my skin.

I sighed contentedly at the smell of his familiar breath and the warmth of his skin. I cuddled closer to him then, searching to bury my face at the crook of his neck. 

"Promise." I said into his skin before giving it a little kiss. 

"Promise." He whispered back into my ear as my consciousness drifted into sleep. 

As I got out of my car, I started to remember more of the good times. The silly times. The stupid times. 

"It won't all fit in the car Stiles!" Derek insisted when I tried to close the trunk of the Impreza with a piece of rope, the sheer volume of luggage inside threatening to spill out.

"Just watch me!" I screamed before jumping on top of the trunk to force it down further. 

"Why are you even doing this?" He said while driving from the passenger seat at another time. "Why can't we switch seats? Why can't I drive?"

"Becaufe if's myf carf!" I said through a mouthful of food while stepping harder on the accelerator. 

"Slow down, we'll die before we even get there." He had exclaimed, his torso half into the driver's side as he struggled to keep the car steady. "That's it, pull over!" 

"I'mf alfmoft donfe!" I insisted, refusing to let up on the accelerator. 

Little things started to trigger more memories as I made my way home. Walking through the grounds of the apartment, I remembered the discussion we had about renting it. 

"Why can't we move closer to the university?" He asked. "I liked that loft." 

"You would. And with what money?" I retorted . "You're not going to ask Cora to give that money back. She needs it for _her_ own college _and_ she doesn't have a Werewolf husband to help pick up the slack. And I don't have it. My scholarship barely pays for my tuition and books."

He huffed out a deep breathe of frustration, looking up and grimacing at the tall, ugly, grey building. "Someone's peeing from their balcony on that side over there." 

"So internal _and_ external bathrooms." I said positively before slapping him on his well muscled back. "It's a fixer upper, but we can fix it together." 

He had looked down at me with a tender smile before leaning in for a kiss. 

"You mean _I'm_ going to be fixing it." He muttered deviously through the kiss. 

A tickle fight had ensued on these very grounds. 

As I made my way up the stairs of the building, always having avoided the elevator due to the persistent stench of piss, I could hear Derek's voice echoing in my ear. 

"Pivot! Pivot!" He had yelled as we carried the, in hindsight, stupidly wide sofa up these very flights. "Peh-vaaaaht!" 

"Shut up, shut up, shuuuuut uuuup!" I yelled back. 

The memories come and go, as I now walked the hallways slowly but with heavy purpose, passing by Mrs. McCormack's apartment beside us, and gave Mr. Goobler's place just across the hall a quick glance before turning to our door. Both were conveniently old and deaf neighbours that probably never heard us christening every square inch of our first apartment with our marital bliss. I supposed that they never probably heard Derek's infidelities either. 

"They can't hear us Stiles. Mrs. McCormack is talking to the TV. She's watching an I Love Lucy rerun. She keeps hitting on Desi Arnaz." Derek had muttered while trying to convince me to relax as he tried to mount me in the kitchen. 

"Are you sure? Maybe she's just trying to throw off the scent. Maybe she's faking you out. Probably schlicking her dried up cat with a bucket of Crisco, waiting for the show!"

"Oh good lord." He had said tiredly, collapsing on top of my naked body on the counter. "Not the visual I needed or wanted right now Stiles." 

The memory faded quickly in my mind, finding myself standing in the empty living room of our apartment. I took a look around at the space I thought was my home. Unfamiliar heavy metal music played in the space, something I never thought Derek listened to. The bathroom door was shut, but the bright orange light from inside spilled out from the seams. 

We had christened that room too, once upon a time. 

"No, you've got to move your hand." He explained while shifting his weight to the right. 

"Ow, ow," I cried out as my head kept banging on the tiled wall, "watch the hair!" 

"You have a buzz cut!" Derek argued as he had moved to better his position under, and in, me. 

"My pubes Derek! You're pinching my pubes! Oh crap!" I managed to yell out before the one leg still touching the ground slipped out from under me. 

Derek cries out as he pulls me tight in his embrace with one hand and breaks our fall with the other. He managed to do it smoothly, stopping my head from slamming into the bathtub floor. I was the first one to laugh. He laughed harder. The laughing made his dick pulse inside of me. So we kept laughing. 

But now I couldn't help but wonder if he had been with other men in that space. Had he laughed with other lovers in there? 

The kitchen may have seemed clean now, but the images from the video were still fresh in my mind. Brody and his friends fucked and bred my husband in that space not long ago. 

"I thought we decided on maroon." Derek grumbled as he stared at the colour I painted on the walls. 

"Maroon is for morons, Derek." I insisted, happily using the roller in a manner that was likely incorrect but doubly fun. "A sombre blue is the way to go!" 

"And why can't you use a ladder?" He asked again with a tired sigh, holding me up off the ground from my waist while I painted the top parts of the wall. "I'm not a ladder Stiles."

"No, you're better!" I pointed out, managing to forget the freshly paint soaked roller on I was holding, splashing some of the paint on my husband.

"Oh, that's it!" He yelled before letting me go and lunging for the roller. 

I laughed as I struggled to keep it away. But Derek liked to play dirty and resorted to tickling to force me to let go and proceeded to cover my clothes and body in paint. 

My laughter echoed through the halls of my memory before fading away, replaced by a screeching, male, voice and heavy drums. I walked to the bedroom and found our bed still unmade, a selection of interesting clothing choices laid out atop them. There were even things I had never seen when I had looked around. There was that leather dog mask, but there was also a muzzle, some rounded and odd looking gloves, a funnel, as well as a rubber dog tail butt plug. 

"You're not eating in our bed Stiles!" The memory of Derek had insisted, arms crossed and glowering at the box of pizzas in my hands. "You're going to make a mess. I don't want it dirty!" 

I had just ignored him and took another long bite while an episode of KonoSuba played on my desktop. 

A notification sounded from Derek's computer, pulling me out of another reverie. I slowly made my way over and found it unlocked. 

I was expecting another video. That maybe it was another long line of OnlyFans related betrayals amongst the countless others. What I didn't expect was an email from the last person I ever expected it from. 

_I can't believe you filmed that_! _Is that the only one you filmed_? _Are you going to post it_? _Can't wait for another visit soon_. - Noah. 

My blood ran cold as the list of things that would break me grew once again. It wasn't even a matter of me wanting to click on the link attached in the email's message body. It was an inevitability. 

Derek's computer automatically opened a media player and the video began. Derek was on all fours on the bed, facing the camera. He was alone for a few moments, naked with his ass up, just staring at the camera. Then the door opened quietly, briefly illuminating the room brighter than before, showing so many familiar things. I recognized the bed. I recognized the sheets. I recognized the pillow cases. I've washed and cleaned those things. 

"Oh, Derek." The man said as he closed the door behind him. His head was still out of frame, but I already knew who he was. "You've been waiting for me?"

"Yes." Derek said before slowly closing his eyes and lowering his torso deeper into the bed sheets, his ass perking up as the man in uniform moved closer. "I've been waiting for this."

"Stiles?" The man asked as he slowly started removing his uniform, throwing aside his belt, badge, and putting his holster on the bedside table. 

"He's with Lydia. Spending the night with her and Scott before the wedding." Derek explained, moving his ass up for attention. "We have all night." 

"Okay. But I want you to fuck me to before this night is over. I want you to knot me, just one more time." The man had completely undressed now and moved behind my husband. Although, considering the conversation and the time stamp on the video, Derek was still my husband to be. 

"Fuck, I wish you could knot me." Derek declared. 

"Me too baby, me too." The man replied, stroking Derek's back before giving his perk ass a light slap. 

Derek moaned obscenely and pleaded, "please, Noah. Fill me up."

My father's face entered the camera frame as he bends over to place little kisses along Derek's back, travelling down to his ass. 

"Don't worry, I will. We have all night." He said between kisses, before diving down and eating out my husband from behind. I watched in shock as my father's face can barely be distinguished as he eats Derek out, who had started jacking his cock and moaning louder in ecstasy. 

My vision started getting blurred. For a moment I thought I was going blind, but quickly realized that these were just tears forming to cloud my eyes. I pinched my eyes shut and willed the tears back inside of me. When next I opened it I grabbed the mouse and jumped ahead in the video. 

"Oh, fuck, yes!" Derek moaned out loud, his eyes rolling back in ecstasy, as my father pounded into him hard, his hands gripping Derek's hips tightly. 

My father then bends his body over Derek's form, while continuing to fuck, and wraps his arm around my husband's neck, using that as leverage to drive into him even harder. I skip ahead again, my hands cold and clammy from the shock. 

My father and Derek were 69'ing. I fast forward again. It was Derek riding my father in front of the camera. I could see my dad's thick, bare, cock stretching Derek's hole as my mate pumped up and down on my father's tool. I skip ahead again. 

My father was on his back, his legs around Derek's body who hovered over him. They were kissing passionately as Derek kept jerking his pelvis into my father's hips. 

"Knot me, baby. I wanna feel you breed me." I heard my father say with his head thrown back as Derek buries his face into the crook of my dad's neck. 

I skip ahead again, near the end. 

They were still in the same position, but this time the two were laughing and talking casually. I recognize this talk and position. It was something Derek and I had done, that we had to do while we waited for his knot to die down.

"Shit, that never gets old." My dad laughed while lightly stroking Derek's back while the younger man was placing light little kisses on my father's shoulder and neck. He even licked and nipped at the clavicle and snuffled at his skin. 

"What?" Derek asks absentmindedly, not distracted at all from his ministrations.

"That feeling of my hole being stretched out by your knot. The fact that I can _actually_ feel you still pumping me full of cum. Fuck, there's nothing like it." My dad said, amazement in his voice. "Stiles doesn't know what he's missing." 

"He can't really take me. He likes the fucking, but he doesn't really like the feeling of getting filled up. He really doesn't like the knot. Says that it feels too weird and it hurts too much, even if I take the pain away." Derek explained. 

They were quiet for a moment before my dad smiled at the man snuffling at his neck. "Well, more for me then." 

I closed the video player and stumbled out of our bedroom. The ringing in my ears was back and much louder than the shitty music that had been playing. The space around me wobbled, like a ship on stormy seas. My vision was murky again. Distantly I saw the bathroom door open and a naked man walked out with a towel around his waist. I watched him slowly, trying to remember who he was. I couldn't recognize the person walking to me until he finally realizes I was there. He stops in his tracks, staring at me with surprise before saying something.

I saw his mouth move, but I couldn't hear anything past the sharp, whistling sound of unimaginable pain. I watched as the man's eyes widen, darting to the room behind me and back to me. I watched his jaw grow slack and his hands drop to his side, dripping water on the coarse, cement floors. He slowly takes a step forward, saying something I couldn't quite hear. His mouth started moving fast, but the words couldn't get past the pain. He stepped in front of me, so casually, with a hand stretched out as if to... comfort? 

I was taught something by someone I cared once. Close your fists tight but don't tuck in the thumb. Put your weight behind it. Swing hard. Swing hard like you're only able to do it once. 

My fist connected to the side of Derek's face and the look of shock that resulted came as quick as the shooting pain in my hand. 

To his credit even though it likely couldn't have possibly been that hard for _him_ , for a Were, he fell to the floor. Even in my daze I couldn't help but acknowledge that small speck of decency of letting himself cower at my pain. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did anyone get the Friends reference? I wasn't plagiarizing... or does that actually count as plagiarizing? I was just trying to reference a stupid scene that I always remember from that show. 
> 
> Also, yes I didn't need to do the end thing that I did in the story. I only did it cause I like fics with that pairing... so I might as well pile on even though, arguably, it was kinda unnecessary. ~(>.<)~ SUE ME!


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The confrontation: Part I.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a long one. The confrontation was never meant to be a one chapter deal. Nor is it meant to fix things. No quick fixes. They have issues, to say the least. Confession: This isn't going to be resolved as easily as some of you suggested. Although a Werewolf killing bullet to the head would solve Stiles' immediate problem, it wouldn't treat the scars. I can't promise all of you guys will like the ending, but I at least hope that it's something that makes sense for the character. 'Cause yeah, I hate those after school special like endings where everything's resolved in the end. Like a 90s sitcom. Hurting people can leave scars. It's more fun for me to write that. 
> 
> That makes me sound a bit evil...

It was difficult to understand what was happening. For a moment, my whole world was just a blur of unimaginable rage. 

"Fight back!" A voice screamed, full of fury and pain and it took me the longest moment to realise it was my own. In the interim, there was just a growing, throbbing pain on my hand that I pushed to the back of my mind. "Fight back!"

Derek's half-prone form on the floor began to break through my consciousness. He was propping his torso up with his hands as his face was furiously thrashed by a flurry of blows. He kept staring at me, only briefly looking away whenever a fist smashed onto the side of his face, causing his head to jerk to the side. But he would only turn back to stare into my eyes, never raising a hand to protect himself, taking what I shortly realised were my own punches in stride. Blood began to soak the skin on his face from little cuts that healed over well before I could even land the next punch. A little bit of regret floated at the back of my awareness at the fact that there probably wouldn't even be a bruise. 

"You son of a bitch, fight back!" I demanded, throwing as much of my weight on my next punch across his jaw. I lost my balance and tumbled forward onto his shoulders. For a moment I felt a hand move to my back before I quickly pushed myself up and onto my feet. I stumbled back onto a lamp that was knocked to the ground, shattering into a dozen jagged little pieces. Without another passing thought, I gripped the largest piece in my throbbing hand and lunged back onto his body to stab it into his chest. 

"Fight back." I demanded between chattering teeth, my head still swimming from the rage. "Damn it. Fight back." 

For the first time I felt Derek shift his weight before bring both hands forward to grip mine, still wrapped around the jagged piece of glass embedded in his chest. 

"No," he whispered before gently pulling the piece of glass from his body. A grunt escaped his lips and even coughs up a little bit of blood onto his bare skin. He slowly turns over my hand and careful unwraps my fingers from the jagged edges of the broken lamp. 

I stared at the torn skin on my hand for a moment, mesmerized by the jagged pattern and the blood. I looked up in time to watch as the tear on Derek's skin began to knit itself, quickly sealing in one, unblemished, piece of raw skin before evening out into a normal colour as if nothing was ever there. I wanted to punch him again, but my body had betrayed me and refused to bend the fingers into a fist. Mustering as much force as I could still manage onto my hand, I swung it across his face, leaving a bloody print on his skin. I winced at the pain that shot across my hand and fell backwards as a result. 

I struggled to my feet and stumbled onto the kitchen, scrambling for the first aid kit I kept in the cupboard. I studied my torn, bloodied hand for a moment and was relieved to find that I had seen far worse on my friends and on my own body before. I ran it under cold water, gently squeezing out some blood before washing it wish soap and water. After applying a copious amount of anti-bacterial cream, I pad it with gauze and wrap the whole thing with a cloth bandage. By the time I had turned around, my head was a bit clearer, the fog broken through by the blood and the pain. Derek stood in the middle of the living room, staring at me without emotion. 

"Are you alright?" Derek asked evenly, his face still not betraying a speck of emotion. 

I started laughing. I started to laugh and I couldn't stop. I stood in the middle of my kitchen with a bloody, bandaged hand, laughing at my naked, cheating husband. Tears began to stream from my eyes, my vision blurring once again. I stumble towards one of the cupboards and pull out a half empty bottle of wine. Still chuckling to myself, I pull the half-lose cork with my teeth and took a large mouthful, my eyes never leaving Derek's naked form. 

I couldn't help but admit that the effect was startling in the light. The tattoo on his thigh, the nipple ring, and the smooth skin was a sight to behold. His body was even more muscular than I had remembered, his shoulders looking bigger now than they did in my memories. I started laughing again. I would find it attractive if it wasn't on a figure that I currently didn't find so reprehensible. The vision before me now was so obvious that I couldn't help but laugh at my obliviousness. How could I not have noticed all of this? Somehow, seeing him so different from the husband that I had married, the man that I knew, that it made things oddly better. 

In a fucked up way, I realised that I could justify that this wasn't the man I married. If I wanted to. To my disgust, there was still that little piece of me that wanted to understand. But I couldn't let go of the emotions that had embedded themselves so deeply into my heart. I wanted to know without letting go of my anger. I chuckled to myself at the thought, realizing just as quickly that even if I wanted to let go, I don't think I ever could.

"Stiles..." he began, raising a hand as if to reach for me but cut himself off as I raised a finger and took another swig of the wine. 

I was all too aware of the dangers of losing my mental balance at this point in time. But I was finding it more difficult than I imagined, trying to confront the man I loved sober. Even knowing full well that I should be, I took another drink. 

"I really shouldn't do this, you know?" I said, after a quick and inelegant burp. "I have a lot to say. I started thinking about everything on the way here, and I ended up writing a script in my head. I had a lot to say. Pretty good things too. Angry things. but sensible, you know? Articulate. But now, after all that bullshit..."

I motioned towards the bedroom with my wine hand, spilling some out of the bottle. I quickly moved the bottle the right way up, immediately regretting the spilled wine. I sighed regretfully at the sight before continuing. 

"I mean, fuck Derek. My _dad_? I..." I tried to search for the words in my increasingly addled brain, still filled with anger but now drenched in wine. "Fuck!" 

I screamed at the top of my lungs, lobbing the bottle at Derek's still form. I probably missed by a mile, the bottle swinging in mid air, drenching the room with what little liquid it had inside of it before smashing against the brick wall.

"Are you done?" Derek asked calmly, his eyes looking into mine. 

"No." I say with conviction, my throat hoarse but firm. "You owe me some fucking answers. You owe me an explanation." 

"Do you really want an explanation?" Derek asked, his voice low. "Is there really anything I can say right now that would make you feel better?"

"No. I don't _want_ an explanation Derek. I deserve one." I said through clenched teeth, holding on to the muffled feeling brought about by the wine as a lifeline to any semblance of sanity. 

"What do you want me to say?" He asked, the confusion was clear in his voice. 

"Anything!" I snapped. 

"Do you still love me?" Derek had the audacity to ask suddenly, looking up at me with heavy lidded eyes, before taking another step forward. 

I took a step back and held up my good hand, my index finger pointing up at the heavens I was currently praying at to strike Derek down. "All the answers right now should come from you. You don't get to fucking change the subject, you don't get to sweep this under the rug, and you don't get to dictate how I act. You've spent the past year, at least, undermining our lives and I deserve to know why. What the hell is wrong with you?" 

"It's not that easy," he began to say slowly, his words trailing off in the end. He must have seen something in my eyes that quickly urged him to continue. He stepped back and sat down on the couch and ran his hands through his still damp hair. "It was a lot of things and it was nothing."

"Fuck the sophism and get to the damn point. Sticking your dick in someone who isn't your husband doesn't take a college course You don't trip and fall in another man's hole. You don't end up fucking my father by mistake. That was deliberate." I argued wildly. "That had intent. All of that was done repeatedly."

"Yes," he admitted with his head down. "I wanted to do it." 

I waited for a half a minute, expecting something else to follow up his confession, but instead Derek just sat there with his head hung low. 

"You wanted to cheat on me?" I pressed, growing frustrated at his taciturn attitude.

"I wanted to fuck." He replied. "I just wanted to fuck. I wanted to feel good. I wanted to feel good but you weren't there. It was that simple."

"I wasn't there? _I_ wasn't there?" I asked, disdain dripping from my voice. "We live together. We share the same damn bed. We're married. How the hell wasn't I there Derek? Because I had school? That's no fucking excuse. I don't remember you trying to jump my bones on the weekend. I don't remember you coming to campus in the hours between my classes. You weren't there."

"Neither were you!" He snapped back, his eyes crinkled with emotion. "There are _two_ people in this marriage Stiles. It takes two people to break a marriage."

"You're blaming me?" I asked coldly, my voice deadly even.

"No. Not really, but," Derek stammered, realising the meaning of his words. "It's not that simple." 

"'I just wanted to fuck. I wanted to feel good. It was that simple', you literally said those words thirty seconds ago." I pointed out. 

"That was the solution. That was what made me feel good. _That_ was easy." He argued, "it was everything else that was hard. Everything else was complicated."

"You mean me? You mean being married to me was hard? Complicated?" I asked.

"Yes. It was." He admitted, he clenched and un-clenched his hands repeatedly before continuing. "I liked it, I admit it. Is that what you wanted to here?"

"It's something. Go on." I said defiantly, narrowing my eyes at his defensive form.

"I liked everything about it, about them. I liked how they smelled, how they tasted, and I especially liked how they made me feel." He spoke in an increasing flurry. "It felt fucking good to be touched. It felt fucking good to be wanted. It felt good to have something other than the pain that you left me with."

"What damn pain? It's only you and me here Derek. Nothing was stopping you from talking to me. Nothing was stopping you from making me understand whatever the hell you were going through. Don't you _dare_ blame me for your poor decisions." 

"I'm _not_ blaming you. I'm just telling you how I feel!" He yelled. 

"I know how you feel!" I yelled back. "I've been feeling it too! Every day. Every hour and every minute that I wasn't with you. But I put up with it because I thought you understood what I was working for. And I tried Derek, I tried to make things better. Every fucking weekend I tried to do something with you even though I was tired, even though there were other things I could do."

"You did them instead of being with me." He countered. 

"You were working." I snapped before scrunching up my face into a sneer. "At least I thought you were. You were probably fucking then too. Weren't you? Instead of being with me, fixing the problems that I never thought were as bad as you're making it out to be, _you_ were somewhere else. Admit it."

"I was." He confessed almost proudly. "You wanna hear all about it?"

"Fuck you." I spat out. 

"Remember Ace, the guy I met working construction?" He asked. 

I did remember him. He was one of the few co-workers and friends that Derek had brought home at first. The first time I met him I felt relieved that Derek found someone to occupy his time with when I wasn't here. He seemed like a good guy. He even showed me one night the "Fuck Me" tattooed on his ass. I laughed with him about it. 

"You slept with him." I say with narrowed eyes. 

"Yes." He hissed. "He was over one night when we were both off. You had drunk a lot and had gone to bed, but we kept talking. He listened, Stiles I told him things that I couldn't tell you."

" _Didn't_ want to tell me. Chose not to tell me." I corrected while as he continued to talk over me. 

"He smelled so fucking good. He stank like lust. He _wanted_ me in a way that you hadn't for some time. And I wanted him too. He went down on me like a fucking pro. He loved sucking my dick and loved the smell of my balls. I fucking ate his ass out like you wouldn't believe."

"You asshole." I said in the middle of his rant. 

"He ate me out too Stiles. Something you _never_ wanted to do." He cried. 

"Burn in hell!" 

"And I fucked him, Stiles. I fucked him hard. He was moaning like a bitch in heat and it didn't even wake you up. We fucked hard, _I_ fucked him hard. I wasn't even holding back. I didn't care if you _did_ wake up. Cause maybe you would do _something_. Anything!"

"You disgusting son of a bitch." I whispered with pain. 

"I knotted him." Derek said casually, a sudden bullet through my heart. "Pretty damn long too. The kind that you hated. We were tied for a full fucking hour and I pumped him full of my jizz. He fucking loved every second of it. He came three more times just from feeling me breeding him."

"Oh my god." I cried, pinching the edges of my eyes, willing the tears not to fall. 

"I was hoping you'd wake up and find us. I thought you would. But _nothing_. You slept through the whole fucking thing. Even afterwards when he asked me to feed him what I put in him with my mouth. It was the kind of thing that you would have hated. We tasted each other in so many ways that night, and he loved what I gave him. He was grateful. Even after I explained _everything_ to him about what I was, he still wanted me. It turned him on and he wanted more. And damn it, Stiles, I liked giving him more." 

I wanted to throw up. I wanted to remove the images from my mind. Ace came over multiple times afterwards. We even started hugging after a little while whenever he left. He came over almost every weekend. He took Derek out to places I didn't want to go to at night, or when I was too tired to do it.

"He introduced you to Brody, didn't he?" I asked the one thing I could articulate from all of my grief and disgust. 

"Yes." He said. 

"He was here. He bred you in Brody's recent video. He was the one filming. In my fucking kitchen." I laid out my theory, hoping it would be wrong. 

"Yes." Derek repeated. 

"I thought he was my friend." The moment I said it, it didn't make sense to me. We never hung out without Derek. I didn't really bother getting to know him outside of Derek's company.

"No he wasn't. He tried. You wouldn't even give him the time of day if I wasn't here." Derek snapped. "I have to say, Stiles, it turned them on like nothing else that you didn't know. I liked that it turned them on so much. You wanted the truth? Yes, Stiles, I _liked_ lying to you. I liked lying about _this_ to you. I liked fucking you after they had bred me full. I liked fucking you while a butt plug held in their spunk inside of me. I liked kissing you awake in the morning after I had eaten their jizz. We even loved fucking around while you were still in the apartment, so fucking ignorant about it all. Hell, I fucked another trick in the bathroom while you suddenly came home one afternoon picking up something you had left behind." 

"Then why didn't you just fucking leave?" I demanded. 

"Because I wanted to stay. Because I fucking love you!" He screamed. 

"Liar!" He yelled before turning to lob a picture of us at him. "You fucking liar. Why did you fucking stay?"

"Because I didn't want to go." He repeated, his voice angrier and more emotional than I had ever known it to be. "I wanted to be with you. Despite everything. In spite of _us_ , I wanted to fix it. To make it right." 

"By fucking those assholes in our den?" I snapped, the truth of which caused him to flinch. "Oh don't you fucking act like what I said was bad. You fucking loved it you bastard. You admitted to loving having them in our den. You knew what an asshole Brody was to me, and you still fucked him. In our house! Make sense, Derek! Make some sense you asshole. Why? Why are you here? Why are you with me? Stop lying about it."

"Because I love you." Derek said tiredly. "I really do. I can't help it."

"Yet you kept fucking around behind my back. You purposefully fucked around my back to _hurt_ me." 

"I couldn't help it." He said before quickly changing his words. "I didn't want to help it. I wanted to do it. But it doesn't change the fact that I still love you." 

"Damn it." I cried, my head swimming from all of it. Everything was deafening; the sounds, the beating of my heart, the pain of it all. 

For a moment, it seemed as though I could hear my sanity cracking. 

"Did it never occur to you, that if you were so sexually unsatisfied that maybe I would have done this with you?" I confessed the one thing I probably shouldn't have. I started to verbally articulate the thoughts that had plagued and disturbed me for the past few days . 

"What?" Derek asked, surprise painted his face. 

"You didn't think that maybe if you wanted to play around, that I might want to do it? As long as it was with you?" I explained. 

"Would you have?" Derek asked, the confusion was clear in his voice. 

"I was eighteen Derek. I married at eighteen. You don't think that there were things I wanted to do in college. I'm still a fucking teenager. Of course I fantasize about shit like this." 

"You would have done it? You would have done this with me?" Derek asked, the skepticism was clear in his voice .

"I would have been willing to talk about it. Maybe I would have done it." He replied, my voice growing colder. "But we'll never know now, will we?"

I took a deep breath and ran my good hand across my sweat slicked hair. 

"We could have done it together. We could have talked. We could have explored this together, as husbands. We could have done this to make each other feel _good_. Fine. Maybe we were in a bad place. Maybe I might not have seen it as well as I could have. Maybe I could have done more. But Derek, you did too much. You were unhappy and instead of talking to me you decided to hurt me."

"I didn't," Derek tried to interrupt but I didn't stop despite his denials. 

"You did. You knew you could have done this differently. Despite how you were feeling, you knew that it wasn't right. You liked hurting me. I didn't fucking deserve it." I snapped.

Derek remained silent as I rambled on, the pain was clearly etched on his face. 

"You asked me." I pointed out, starting to pace the room in my frustration. "You're the one who asked me to fucking Werewolf marry you. You're the one who bought a ring and got down on one knee to ask, not me. I wanted to leave but you're the one who wanted to go with me. You're the one who asked!" 

" _I_ didn't want you to leave. I didn't want you to go. How else was I supposed to stay with you?" He argued. 

"So you lied to me? Fucked around behind my back? Fucking other people behind my back is a good way to go, not to stay." I pointed out coldly, wincing in pain as I mistakenly tried to make a fist with my wounded hand. I cradled it for a second before moving back to the kitchen, rooting through cupboards for pain medication. I quickly swallowed two pills after finding them, not even bothering to check whether or not they should have been taken considering how much alcohol I had drunk. I didn't really care. 

"Is that how you feel, now? That you want me to go?" Derek asked, his voice hitching at the question. 

"How I feel? You're asking me how I feel? You think I can make decisions based on how I feel?" I started to laugh again at the absurdity of the question. "I can't make decisions based on how I feel. I went looking for a dead body when I was sixteen. I've hunted insane werewolves. I ran _towards_ scary monsters. I _looked_ for them. I almost got eaten by a sentient tree. My life is _full_ of monsters in the dark and I don't remember when I stopped caring. Fuck, I married one at eighteen."

Derek flinched at the implications of my words. I relished it. 

"Clearly I can't be trusted to make decisions based on how I feel." I rambled wildly, my good hand flailing with the emotions I couldn't contain. I ended up swinging my arms at one of the lamps, causing it to crash to the floor. I just stepped over the broken pieces, realizing just at that moment that I was still wearing my shoes. I shouldn't have been wearing my shoes indoors. Now I was tracking dirt in. That would be difficult to clean out. 

"I felt curious and it got my best friend bitten by monster. I felt curious and I got possessed by a ghost. I felt curious and I got you." I explained while looking down at my shoes, noticing the blood on them for the first time. They must have been Derek's. I looked up at him and bared my soul, "I can't trust my feelings. Because I feel like I still love you. I feel like forgiving you. So that probably means both of those are terrible decisions. I've realised recently, with tremendous clarity, that I am not a healthy person. At least not with you."

"I love you too." He whispers in a quick breath, his eyes closed tight, his fists closed at his sides. 

"You fucking monster." I said calmly, causing Derek to wince at my words. "You fucking lying monster. Even now you can't even manage to tell the truth."

"I do." He started to say, opening his eyes to look at me imploringly. "I do love you."

"You don't do that to people you love..." I said, interrupting his confession.

"But I did it. Even now I still love...," he insisted. 

"Stop fucking lying." I snapped over his words, stumbling back a bit while trying to fight against the tears that threatened to escape. 

"I do, Stiles," he repeated, walking closer to me with long, desperate steps, ignoring my cries. 

"Shut up!" I pleaded, shaking my head to try and shake off the addling that threatened to overwhelm me once more.

"Stiles, I love..." he began but was abruptly cut off by a swift blow to the side of his face. He stumbled to the side with a heavy sound, his head smashing against the floor.

"Shut up!" I screamed, still clutching the now broken baseball bat in my hands. I don't even remember when I had picked it up off the wall. 

For a moment there was no pain, only the anger, but soon after my right hand throbbed badly as sharp, shooting pains shot through my wounded hand. "Fuck!"

I drop the broken bat and cradle my wounded hand against my body as I stepped over Derek's prone form. I went back to the kitchen, opened the freezer door, and grabbed the small bag of ice we usually kept in case we had company. I ripped it open over the sink with my teeth and poured it out before shoving my wounded, cloth, covered hand into them. I gritted my teeth for several minutes as I waited for the cold to soothe my throbbing hand. 

Behind me I heard Derek stirring and quickly threw a look over my shoulders to watch him stagger to his feet. He spits out a mouthful of blood onto the floor before cradling his jaw with a hand. He steadies himself for a moment on a nearby table, before moving to pull shards of glass out of his skin. It was cathartic to realize that he had fallen atop the sharp, shards of glass from the lamp that I had broken. Oddly he staggers towards the bathroom, not even glancing in my direction before going in, not bothering to close the door. I listened to the water running in the background quietly, still keeping my hand submerged in the sink-full of ice. My previously addled brain was starting to calm down now, and by the time I heard him moving behind me, I was starting to think a bit clearer than before. I don't know how long it was before the silence was broken by my rumbling stomach. 

Absentmindedly I carefully took my wounded hand out of the sink and carefully wiped it with a clean cloth. I moved to one of the cupboards and began to take out some pots and pans before moving to the fridge. Not bothering to turn to glance at Derek as I began pulling food out of the fridge with my good hand and throwing them on the counter. Derek moves quietly, pulling out a cutting board and a knife and grabbed the vegetables I had pulled out and began cutting them into small pieces. 

I threw one of the pans onto the stove, turned it on, then added a bit of oil. With my good hand I grabbed a wooden spoon and waited as Derek threw minced garlic onto the pan. I wait for it to sizzle before stirring it with the spoon, Derek meanwhile occasionally wordlessly added more ingredients to the pan. I put the wooden spoon aside and moved to grab soy sauce from one of the cupboards, using my teeth to wrench open the cap before moving back. Derek had already added the meat, so I just poured a small amount of soy sauce as Derek stirred slowly. I moved over to grab the bowl of assorted vegetables he had cut and piled atop a bowl and poured it onto the mixture in the pan. Derek stirs quietly while I moved again to grab clean plates out of the cupboard. I walk to our small, dining table and laid out the clean plates and moved to grab some utensils from the drawer. By the time I had made my way back to the table, Derek had already put a sizeable portion of food on each plate and calmly sat on his side of the table. I dropped a fork and butter knife on the spot next to his hand before moving to my side and sat down quietly. 

I stared at the sizzling food for a moment, listening to the sounds escaping the cooked meat. I listened to the sounds of cutlery clanging against his plate as Derek ate his meal. I stared at the simple food before me and waited for the desire to eat. I could hear Derek's chewing in the background, but I didn't look up to watch him. I kept studying my food, watching the little wisps of smoke trail into the air before vanishing. I wondered what that would be like. 

As quickly as this thought crossed my mind, I realized I didn't want to disappear. I didn't want to vanish. The cool numbness in me faded and the anger came back. I was grateful to find that the pills and the ice seemed to have helped with the pain, so with as much force as I could muster I grabbed the plate with both hands and threw it at his face. The plate smashed against his head before tumbling to the floor, the food painting a trail on the table and on his body. He had snapped back against his seat, his body frozen and eyes trained on me with an impassive look on his face.

I calmly reached over to pull his plate towards me and began to eat. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this was a lot to write. Also not remotely done. 
> 
> BTW: I read that some people were wanting something, so I just wanted to address it here in one instead of manually replying. I wanted to know what you guys think of me adding side stories to this fic? Not really making it a series, just the side stories would be something like Derek's OnlyFans exploits. Basically just a lot of smutty, varied, and sometimes kinky, sex. But that would mean I'd be writing those one time SS entries on top of this. Or I can do it after. I don't mind doing it during. I actually do like the challenge of writing imaginative, if not deranged, sex scenes. So I dunno how to do this? Voting? I just wanted to read some opinions and I'll make a decision based on that (and time). 
> 
> Then again. I don't think COVID is gonna go anywhere anytime soon... and I like this distraction/creative exercise.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Exhaustion settles in, but Stiles persists in his quest to understand why before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part II of the talk. 
> 
> You guys ever been really angry during an argument? How long did it last? Could you think clearly the entire time? How did you feel after? I usually slept like a log. Anger exhausts me. I just don't have the constitution to bottle too much rage. 
> 
> Also, I updated the tags as per some people's suggestion. Thanks for the reminder.

I finished loading the dishwasher with relative ease, despite my wounded hand. I hadn't bothered cleaning the spilled food. In fact, I just ignored or moved around most of the detritus that littered the room. Before tonight, it would have annoyed me to leave things so messy. But looking around and knowing everything that had tainted this place, it had begun to feel a lot less like home. While Derek showered and changed his clothes, I had time to take stock of where I had lived all this time. Strangers had been here, doing things to my husband. There were things here that I never knew existed, kept by my husband in plain sight. I couldn't help but wonder when I became a stranger in my own home. 

It was the small things that I found especially annoying. Like how it was only now that I realized that that we had groceries that I knew Derek never bought. The fridge was stocked with beer that I knew Derek never drank. There was left over food that I knew Derek would never eat. Derek hated Indian food. Actually, he hated anything that was heavily spiced as it bothered his nose too much. But there it was. This, frankly, made me feel more bitter than most since I loved curry and I haven't had any since marrying him. On the dresser in the middle of the room was a pair of leather cuffs that I had never seen before. The most obvious, and something that I am ashamed to say I never thought much of, were the multiple camera stands placed strategically all over the room.

There was one that was mounted on the wall, overlooking the middle of the living room. There was a standing one near the kitchen, as well as the far end of the room. There was even a camera stand currently leaning against the wall next to the bathroom door. Of course. They would have filmed in the bathroom too. 

"Are you done? The people downstairs just came home. They're drunk by the sound of it, but even they might call the cops if you keep trying to kill me." Derek joked the moment he got back from changing his clothes, still drying his hair with a towel. 

He still looked beautiful in my eyes. I hated knowing full well my feelings for him hadn't gone away. I hated knowing that despite everything, all I wanted right now was to cuddle into his arms. The fact that being in a constant state of rage was exhausting. Being angry was exhausting. Perhaps that was the secret Werewolf diet plan. Maintain a constant state of misery for a chiselled physique. Are fat werewolves mild mannered and happy? That seemed liked a rude question to ask, even in my head. 

I leaned back against the wall behind my back and let my legs give way, slowly sliding down to the floor. My knees creaked at the effort, oddly emphasizing my own mortality in my mind than my wounded hand ever did. I wondered if Ace, Brad and even Jack ever had to worry about creaky knees. Did they have to change positions during sex when it became too unbearable to sustain too? Do they clean themselves out? Did they douche? How? Were they better at douching? Way better douchebags in my books, yes. But did it take them over an hour to clean yourself out for Derek too? Or maybe... did Derek not care with them? Maybe it didn't matter with them the same way it mattered with me? That might have been a question I never wanted to know the answer to. 

"Are you okay?" Derek asked before sitting down on the floor not far from me. He leaned back against the same wall that was tasked with keeping my body upright. 

"Nobody ever tells you that how exhausting it is." I muttered knowing full well that even if I did, he would hear me clearly. 

"What is?" He asked softly, staring at something along the far wall of our den. 

"Hatred." I said. "Misery. Anger. I'm just realising now how much conviction it must take to stay like this."

"It's not easy. You could always just let it go," he said. 

I ignored his suggestion and continued. "It kind of makes me admire Peter."

"What?" Derek asked, surprised. 

"All those years. Awake but unable to live. He might not have been moving, but he held onto that hatred for so long. It kept him alive. It gave him purpose." I explained, recalling that at that time, my opinion of Peter's conviction was drastically different. 

"He's a psychopath. Not really a role model." He replied. 

"It would be easier to be angry at you as a psychopath. It would be easier to hurt you. Not only would I want to, but I probably wouldn't feel guilty if I did. I probably wouldn't get tired at all." I remembered that the Nogitsune never tired. It never felt guilt. It successfully caused the damage it had set out to do. 

"You're probably not the first jilted spouse who wanted to kill their husbands." Derek joked. "You've done more than most, but I'm still here."

I wondered if I wanted to be. 

"You know it takes more than that to kill a Were. I'm just happy you didn't really want to. Because I know you could." He continued, a little playful smirk on his lips. It was probably meant to ease the tension, but it just pissed me off all over again. 

"I know." I said evenly before pointing at the mess. "I'm not cleaning that up."

"I didn't ask you to." 

"Did they know?" Asking another question that had crossed my mind but was afraid to entertain. It seemed to absurd... but it was become increasingly difficult to argue against the possibility of it being true. 

Derek seemed to know what I was asking and he turned to look at my straight in the eyes as if insisting on the truth of his answer. "No. The pack didn't know. Except for Peter."

"Bullshit." I retorted, slowly becoming convinced by my own paranoid theories. "You're telling me that they didn't see, hear, or _smell_ anything? I know how the pack works. They can't go one day without pointing out who nutted into who's ass the night before." 

"You smell like your dad." He pointed out, shocking me from my thoughts. 

"What?" I asked, surprised. 

"There's not much difference in your smell. You eat the same things. You use the same laundry detergent. You use the same soap. You drink the same things, except for beer. Even then, you started drinking a bit more when you turned eighteen, whenever you could." He explained in a surprising amount of detail. "None of them use their noses well enough to notice the difference."

I was silent for a moment, wrapping my mind around the possibility that maybe the pack didn't betray me too after all. "Except Peter." 

"Except Peter." Derek confirmed. "I know you might not believe me, but they really didn't know about me and your dad. They're busy enough with their own secrets, they didn't really have time to entertain mine. Except Peter. He... he's been with your father too. But that's something else entirely." 

Shaking my head, I changed the subject in an effort to rally what was left of my righteous indignation and dinner. My father with Derek was enough of a painful revelation, I no longer had the spare emotional resource to even entertain the possibility of my dad and Peter. 

Or, really, it all could have been a lie. After the years I've known him and everything we've been through, though I didn't know Derek to be a liar, I still acknowledge his ability to obfuscate the truth. He would hate the comparison, but I realised years back that it was a skill he shared with Peter. Derek had no qualms about using his looks to get his way. I refused to be charmed by him. My exhaustion did not change him into a better man. Confessing the truth and sharing all the lurid details did not exonerate. My exhaustion did not absolve my husband of his infidelity. With tremendous effort not to groan during the act, I forced myself to my feet. My questions wouldn't answer themselves. 

"The camera stands. You used them to shoot your movies?" I asked while pointing at every single one. It really was a surprising amount. Was I really so obtuse? 

Derek was quiet for a second, and I knew he was observing my demeanour carefully. 

"I'll try not to stab you this time." I said nonchalantly while observing the wall mounted stand, tracing the eye line of the thing back to living room. 

"Yeah." He said casually. "I don't use most of them during shoots."

He stood up too and began moving around the room, looking at the things I was referring to. It was only then that I realised that he must have spent a lot of money on not only those things, but the things in his bedroom too. I swallowed back the bile from the realisation that my husband has spent money on other things than our life. He had probably spent it to satisfy all those men in his life. To keep up appearances and entertain all those strangers who liked to watch. Meantime, I don't remember the last time we had treated each other, treated me, to a night out. 

"Most of my subscribers aren't picky," he continued. His voice breaking through my reverie. "But I like to play around with style sometimes. Use a few of them to get different angles. But more often than not, their tastes are pretty simple."

"I guess that one's for the bathroom?" I pointed at the stand leaning against the wall, pushing aside my painful little revelation. I filed and boxed it up next to all the other painful things I've had to keep inside these past few days. 

"Yeah. Ace likes to shoot there." Derek confesses while fiddling with the back of the couch. 

"Oh, I thought he liked being dirty." I mocked. 

"He does." Derek remarked. "He likes piss play. Giving and receiving. It's easier to do in the bathroom. Otherwise, when we do it out here, I have to clean up as much as I can or try and take or give it all without spilling."

"Shit." I muttered angrily. More because the image of it turned me on for a very brief moment, regretfully. 

It was all to easy to picture. Ace's or even Brody's muscular forms looming over Derek, emptying their full bladders into my willing husband's mouth or wherever else. Hopefully my lust was quickly squashed by the disgust I felt at it being with Ace or Brody. Or even maybe even with other strangers I'm ignorant of.

"That turns you on?" Derek asked with a bit of playful happiness in his voice.

"Fuck off." I spat angrily. "I like _nothing_ about this." 

"No, it's fine. We can do it you know. If you want. I'd like to do that with you." Derek said fervently, walking towards me with hopeful eyes and eagerly raised arms. 

"Did you use those cameras with my dad? Or was that the only one?" I asked quickly, taking a few steps back until the question stopped Derek in his tracks. I was equally horrified at having to ask the question and relieved that it distracted Derek from his apparently mounting joy. He needed to stay down in the dirt with me, dwelling in our shared misery. 

Derek was deathly still, casting his eyes down at my words, his body tense. He was quiet for so long that I had to ask the question again. 

"So?" 

"That," Derek breathed slowly, "was the only time. The other times, we didn't." 

"The only time that you filmed it?" I pressed, knowing full by now that Derek tried not to qualify his infidelities if he didn't too. Even though I had no guarantee that he had been telling the truth, I suspect that everything he had said this night was not a lie. At most, he had been trying to hide part of the truth, hoping I would not delve further into things. "But you've fucked more than once?" 

Derek's jaw stiffened at the question, his posture straightening up defiantly. "Yes." 

"Why did you ask me to marry you Derek? Why did you even come with me? Why did you stay?" I couldn't help but ask, feeling like a damn parrot in a cage. These were the words that were repeating in my mouth and in my head. Or more like a trained circus monkey, juggling the same ball of emotions until they inevitably came crashing down on my life. 

"Not again, I've already told you," Derek began before I stopped him again. 

"You fucked my father _before_ our wedding day." I pointed out, "and it apparently wasn't the first time. So how the hell is that related to you being unhappy now? You've told me how you felt. You used it to explain why you fucked all those other men, and why you keep doing it. But it seems you've fucked my dad before all of this even happened. So why, Derek?"

I was tired from the constant barrage of heavy emotions from the past few days, and I could feel my righteous fury dimming by the minute. But it was not because of a desire to forgive and forget, but because of actual, physical exhaustion. I was tired. I was sore. I was just ready to crawl into a hole and forget myself. But for my sanity I was forcing myself forward, inching to any conclusion that could bring me any measure of peace. 

"I don't understand. Were you unhappy back then too? Enough to fuck around with my dad? So, why the hell did you stay with me?" I asked again, still trying to wrap my head around why Derek even was with me in the first place, if he had been so unhappy. Why did he even say that he loved me? Why does he still say it? 

"That was different." Derek insisted quietly, moving to take a seat on the leather couch I didn't remember buying. But that was by the by. 

"How?" I asked with a hitch in my voice, my control slipping ever so slightly. I supposed it would be difficult for anyone to ask their husband why they fucked their father. 

Derek looked up at me for the first time, studying my eyes. He shifted in his seat a few times, even fidgeting with his clothes. His mouth opened and closed a few times as if he had decided at the last minute to take back what he was about to say. I didn't even try to rush him. Whether if it was because I was giving him the opportunity to better articulate himself, or if I was stalling for time as I tried to decide if I really even wanted to know the answer. 

All those other men were could be treated differently. I could put them in a different box. I could understand them even if I did not forgive it. If it had just been them, then... maybe how I felt would be different too... but I'm not really sure. Maybe if it had just been the other men, then at least I could understand that it really had been the marriage that ruined us. Or the distance. But he had slept with my father. I couldn't make up my mind whether or not I really wanted to know why. 

"Do you really want to know?" Derek asked instead, as if he had read my mind. 

Faced with the question I had been asking myself all of this time, I couldn't help but become a little bit reticent. I moved to the seat across from Derek and settled in slowly, taking the time to consider all the voices in my brain. What did I want to know? What use was it knowing? 

"Why do you want to know?" Derek asked again. 

"Did you sleep with him before you ever... before we ever," My voice trailed off at the end, unable to ask the question, no longer wanting to know the answer. But it was too late. 

"Yes." Derek confessed quietly. 

I gripped my leg with my good hand before moving to put my head between my knees. Taking in deep breathes as I tried to clear the buzzing in my mind, I began to count leaves again. I didn't even get to two whole leaves before Derek's voice broke through my concentration. 

"But that was before I ever got to really know you. Before we got together." He had added quickly, as if he was desperate to explain himself. 

"That fucking doesn't make it any better." I said evenly, trying to bite back the bile that threatened to spew from my throat. "You fucked him before our wedding. From the sounds of it, you screwed around more than that." 

"We were... involved. Before we even," he began but stopped his words and sighed in frustration. "We liked each other. But it wasn't right at the time."

"Wasn't right?" I laughed incredulously. "Well it isn't right now. You have some poor fucking timing buddy." 

"I was a murder suspect, Stiles. He was the Sheriff." He explained. "It wasn't planned. He tried to end it the first time. But, it was hard to resist. For the both of us." 

"Somehow I'm doubting you tried that hard." I snarled.

"Look, it wasn't like that." He insisted through gritted teeth. "He understood what I was going through."

"What, and I don't? Is that why you slept with him before our wedding?" I pressed.

"He understood what it was like," he insisted. "He knew exactly what it was like to be where I was, to have lost everything. He understood what it was like to lose somebody!"

"So do I!" I screamed at his face. "And so does Melissa. So does Cora. But they _never_ used that as an excuse to screw over the people that they loved." 

I got up and walked towards the window, pressing my forehead on the cool, hard, glass. For a moment I watched the city lights outside my window and wondered what it would be like to be anywhere else. I wondered if it was better knowing what I knew now. Was all this pain worth it? Do I really need anymore questions?

"Why did you fuck him before our wedding?" I asked, sadly. I hated the question. I hated asking the question. I hated that the question was about my father and my husband. It was embarrassing. It was so fucking stupid that you'd think it was something from Jerry Springer. Who knew one day I'd be one of those people I mocked all those years ago, binge watching trashy after-school TV with Scott on a Friday evening? It's so stupid. It's so damn painful. 

"I didn't do it to hurt you." He insisted sadly. For a moment, it was almost like there was a slight quiver in his voice. But I didn't bother to turn to look. It was difficult to think of a monster who was capable of such heartless things to be capable of something human like regret. "I was in a dark... it was hard. I just..."

I watched through the window pane as his blurred silhouette moved behind me. I saw the indistinct reflection of his hand reach for me before I felt it on my shoulder. It was easier watching his indistinct figure in the glass. 

"Please, if anything else," he said softly, "trust me when I say I didn't do _that_ to hurt you. It felt good. I wanted to feel good. But that doesn't mean that it didn't feel good with you... that it isn't good with you."

"Oh Jesus Christ," I say with exasperation, shaking off his hand and moving away to the other side of the room. 

"Stiles, please. Listen to me." He pleaded. 

"I think I've listened enough." I said with a wobble in my voice, holding back the welling sobs that I had repressed the entire evening from breaking through my tenuous self control. 

"You're father _means_ something to me, yes." He explained in a rush. "He's family. He's pack. I love him. But nothing like I love you. You are something else in my life. You are _mine_ and I am _yours_. What I did with your dad was wrong. I admit that. But we didn't do it to hurt you. Please, you have to understand that. I do love you Stiles. _He_ loves you too."

I laughed mockingly, if not manically, at the declaration. "No. No, you don't do that to people you love. That's fucked up, Derek. That was fucked up. There is no universe where fucking your husband's father behind his back before your wedding is _remotely_ moral." 

"No, you're not understanding it!" Derek maintained with a harsh shake of his head. He grasps his head with both hands before extending both of them towards me, pleadingly. "It's about love Stiles. Different kinds of love. I don't love you any less because I loved him too. I don't want you any less because your dad and I wanted each other too. I shouldn't have done it, I'll say that much. If anything, I should have been honest with you. We both should have. But what I did with him doesn't mean I lied to you! You know that I love you." 

"All I need is you," I said with conviction. Derek's eyes light up at the words for a moment, and as much as I hated to admit it, I didn't enjoy dimming them again. "Do you remember saying that?"

"What?" He asked, confused.

I resisted the urge to sob, mustering enough effort to swallow that particular frog that threatened to hop out of my throat. "That's what you said to me before you proposed. Before you said you would follow me anywhere. 'All I need is you'."

"I do." Derek declared with heat in his voice. 

"Except my dad." I pointed out. "And Ace. And Brody. And Jack. That blond guy who cooked my dinner. The food you took credit for. Who else? The people who follow you online? People who like watching you, who fucked you, who _you_ fuck?"

"That's different." He said breathlessly, but I heard the words clearly nonetheless. "That's..." 

"You _liked_ lying to me. You liked lying about _this_ to me. That's what you said right?" I recalled, with a bit of pain. But surprisingly, it was a bit numbed. Briefly I wondered why. Maybe I really was that tired. There's probably a limit until a person starts to go numb from the hurt instead. If you stabbed a man in the heart and he survives, and never removes the knife, would he feel the pain forever? 

"I, that's," he stammered. "I was angry. That's not what I meant."

"Alright, fine. What did you mean, then? Tell me, what did you mean Derek? What message did you want to send by fucking all of those people behind my back? By saying all of those things? By fucking my goddamn father?" I asked with the coldest voice I could muster. 

"I meant," he began. To my surprise, I could see tears flowing from Derek's eyes. I had never seen him cry before. Not even when some of the pack died. It was kind of weird. "I meant, I liked doing it but I didn't like doing it to you. I liked doing those things _because_ I had a husband, but not because that husband was you. I liked how it felt with them, but I don't like hurting _you_. Please, you have to understand that."

I laughed dryly at his explanation, already far too tired of this whole affair. "If anything, I admire your ability to compartmentalize morality. It takes a special fucking skill. How am I supposed to react at the fact that my husband gets off on hurting me?" 

"I made a mistake, Stiles." He insisted. "You said yourself, that maybe this is something we can do together instead. It should have been like that from the start. It can be different. It can be good for you as it is for me."

"Oh my god." I said under my breath, closing my eyes shut tightly, willing the world to turn the right side up again. 

To my surprise, Derek lunges straight towards me before I even had the chance to notice . He's breathe was close to my face, his hands holding my wrist, shocking my eyes open. I try to draw back, but he pulls me forward with measured force, vigorously but not unkind. He lays his forehead against mine. 

"It can be good." He repeated, maybe more to himself than to me. His eyes were closed tight, but his grip never slackened. 

"Stop it." I said as calmly as I could manage. 

"I can make you feel good. We can make each other feel good." Derek insisted, even going as far as to shower soft kisses on my forehead and my cheeks. I turned my head when he tried to kiss me on my lips. His eyes fluttered open, intense and glowing an electric blue. "Please, try it. For me. For us. I know you love me."

"Let me go." I said anxiously, trying to pull my wrists from his grip. 

"I know you love me." He insisted. "Say it!" 

His eyes were intense, still shining that electric blue. My heart was pounding hard on my chest. I knew that he could hear that. I knew that he could smell the fear that was probably filling this room. But I could also see the desperation in his lonely blue eyes. 

"I love you." I confessed. His grip loosens as a result of my honesty, a genuine smile growing on his face. As the electric blue began to fade, they were replaced by a hopeful twinkle that I soon crushed. "But I don't want to." 

The confession holds him in place, those lonely eyes staring into mine as if trying to find the lie. But I knew he would have heard the honesty of those words from the even beating of my heart. Whether or not I managed to pull myself from his grip or he let me go, doesn't matter as much that it allowed me to walk away. 

"Please, come back." He said in a low, pleading voice, his eyes reaching for something his hands could no longer touch. 

I turn back briefly, looking around at what remained of my broken home. Shattered glass littered the floor amongst various wooden and ceramic debris. Food lay wasted on the floor, while specs and pools of blood stained the ground. 

"We're married." I said, exhaustion oozing from my voice. "We were married. It's supposed to make us better. We were supposed to make each other better. Together."

I looked at all the broken and bleeding things and couldn't think of anything good. There's still love there. That, I couldn't deny. But it hurt too much. Whenever I looked at his wounded form, so much in me still screams to comfort him. Maybe we could make it work. Maybe I just need time to think. Maybe it could be different from now on. Maybe this was the hard thing that we could get past and make things better. He could be better. We could be better.

"Yes," he said earnestly and hopefully, making me realise then that I had been muttering some, if not all, of those words under my breath. 

I shook my head and began to softly pound my chest, trying to clear the indecision in my mind, and the wavering of my heart. "It's supposed to make us better. But look at all of this Derek. Look at all these broken things and the blood in our den. I did that. Look at how we feel right now. It's made us worse. I'm worse. You didn't make me better Derek. I don't like what I am right now because of you. But I want to be better."

He stood there quietly listening to the words that escaped my lips, his hands limp at his side. "You just need some time to think. You're my mate, Stiles. I'm yours. I know you'll be back. I know you will. You won't leave me too." 

Despite understanding the immensity of his words, I still turned my back and left the weight of them behind. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter: Stiles tries to forget and feel good about himself and finds someone who gives him some perspective.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles gets an apology and someone's perspective.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was much longer chapter, but I moved things around and split it. I was gonna bring a character in that I mentioned before, but I moved that to the next chapter. It's still a really long chapter. 
> 
> This was basically me fulfilling my desire to write a story chapter around a song as the character moved about in a addled state. If it sucks, sue me. I'll keep going anyway. :/ I like Annie Lennox dammit!
> 
> I updated the tags to include drug use and dubious consent.

I don't remember pulling over the side of the road, nor having my panic attack. I don't remember driving at all. The first thing that came to mind was my desperation to open the door and vomit out into the street, gasping for breath. I stumbled out in my grief, emptying the contents of my stomach in the dark until there was nothing left. I ungracefully picked myself back up onto my seat and took stock of where I was. It was just another small, empty, back road in a quiet night. I didn't know how much time I had spent grieving in the dark, let alone know where I was. After wiping my damp face with my sleeve, I drove onward aimlessly, only half paying attention to the road. 

I had nowhere to go. I hadn't brought anything with me before leaving the apartment. I only had a bagful of my school things in my trunk. I had no plan. I had no desire to be anywhere. So I just kept on driving aimlessly in the dark, letting my mind drift peacefully in a sea of blank thoughts. Just taking in the lights of the streetlamps as I passed them by, following the traffic lines on the ground like a meditation. 

I was tired of thinking. Thinking meant thinking about Derek and my failure of a marriage. Thinking meant my failure as a husband. I just wanted to drive. Eventually all the roads and all the lamps became the a background in my consciousness. It was a miracle that I hadn't killed anyone that night in my mindless drive. Eventually, my car shook and sputtered, having just enough life in it to be driven to the side of the road. I coasted to a park on a sidewalk before the car died completely. The last thing I saw was the clock on the dash flashing sometime after midnight. The fact that it wasn't the next day yet was surprised me. It had already felt like a very long night. 

The anger that I felt at the realisation that I had not filled the tank for several days was actually a relief. It was the first kind of anger that I had felt that was not directly tied to my husband. It was oddly reassuring. At least I still had enough life in me to get angry at mundane things like forgetting to fill up on gas. It, surprisingly, made me feel better having such a mundane problem as I sat there in the dark. 

Someone slamming against the side of my door almost made me jump out of my skin. But the laughing and giggling of two very drunk people and their romantic interludes against the side of my car quickly assuaged my worst fears. After a few more, loud, obscene noises, they shuffled off in their drunken haze into an alley way. I stepped out of my car and looked around me to find myself completely lost. I fished my phone out of my pocket only to find that the battery had died. It wasn't the best time to realize that I hadn't brought my charger with me that day. It was still back hom-- at the apartment. 

Sighing heavily, I walked towards the last signs of life I had witnessed and followed the affectionate couple into the alleyway. As my tired mind worked to formulate some sort of plan, a dull thumping noise began to break through my consciousness followed by the soft sounds of music. There was a light at the end of the alleyway, with happy people running about the exit. As I neared the end, the music filled the air with an electric and energetic tempo. People were walking and stumbling about, their laughter filling the air. Flashy neon signs lit up the street, and the sounds of traffic were mostly muted by the sounds of people living their lives. People were eating at the patio of restaurants, enjoying the cool breeze of the night. There was the clinking of glass and the scratching of silverware on glass plates, as people ate their meals in relative peace. Lines of people stretched across the side walk, as if waiting for their turn to get into... wherever. I felt confused and alone, standing there and watching people have fun after the night I'd had. Somehow, through no fault of their own, it didn't feel alright. I didn't want to be alone in my grief and I couldn't go back to the one person I wanted to share it with. 

A heavy booming laugh to my left pulled me out of my reverie as I watched a tall woman with an electric pink beehive descend down a flight of steps that was painted neon pink. Without much reason to do so, or anything at all for that matter, I followed her down and through an elegantly designed wooden door. There was a tall man sitting beside a tall standing table, totally engrossed in his phone. 

"Cover's ten bucks. Put it in the pot." He said nonchalantly, his attention never drifting from his device. 

I fished the money out of my pockets and deposited it in the little wooden box in front of him, only partially reprimanding myself since I probably could have used that for gas. But, I didn't really need gas at that time. I didn't really have anywhere to go. 

I walked forward in relative darkness down a long hallway, lightly decorated by glowing, colourful, neon hand prints on the walls. A soft, melodic tune echoed off the walls from the distance as I stumbled around in the dark. I passed by silhouettes of bodies through the hall, indistinct and blurred in my consciousness, barely lit by the dim glow of the neon paint light. The melodic tune heightened as I turned a corner in a daze, and a flash of light filled my eyes before moving off to the side. The room was filled with gently dancing and writhing bodies that moved to the steady beat of the music. Everyone seemed to glow neon colours and were wildly dressed. There seemed to be every conceivable colour of hair represented in the room, and everyone's fashion sense could only be described as eclectic.

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. Three heavily made up men in tutus and white feather headbands lip-synched to a gentle chorus on a brightly lit, and eccentrically decorated, stage at the far end of the room. Their bearded chins stood out on a face covered in white foundation and colourfully painted swan-like eyelids. 

I mindlessly waked forward, entranced by the colours and the musical crescendo that broke through my numbed consciousness. 

"Alright Queens and Germs and everything in between, here to entertain you all are the Bitches Three!" A tall woman, dressed in what could only be described as 'stern-headmistress-at-a-private-school-in-Equestria', presented the act behind her with a sensuous pose. 

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. The three sang again, changing their poses with slow, deliberate, extensions of their hairy limbs. 

"And of course the one King to rule them all, King Vinny V. D'Vici!" The woman proclaimed with an elaborate bow to the stage. A gentle golden spotlight descended on a still form standing in the middle of the stage, dressed in a luxurious suit coated in sparkling gems that reflected the spotlight. An equally ornate golden crown sat atop the King's head, riddled with gemstones and glass. 

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. The three singers began to circle the King, dancing on their toes and caressing the air with exaggerated hand motions. 

The King gently looked up at the spotlight, showcasing a sharp, diamond shaped face. The full ruby lips and darkly painted, monochromatic, face stood out amongst their white pants and suit riddled with colourful gemstones.

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. The three dancing singers moved to the side of the stage in a row, on their tiptoes, and bowed deeply to their king. 

_I used to be a lunatic from the gracious days_. The King lip-synced, touching their chest with their hand, nails sharp and painted a crimson red. 

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. The three dancers mouthed as they began moving to the King's back, performing an elegant, ballerina-esque coordinated dance in the background. The singers' voices echoed as the music seemingly permeated every conceivable space in the packed venue. 

_I used to feel woebegone and so restless nights_. The King sang, turning their eyes on the captivated and slowly swaying crowd. _My aching heart would bleed for you to see_.

I turned and moved to the bar as the King's song echoed around the densely packed room. I pushed past the men, women, and everything beyond and between that were enthralled by the performers on the stage, swaying gently to the beat of the song. Their various eccentric clothes and costumes bumping against my body along the way.

"What're you having?" The bartender asked over the music, catching my eyes. 

It took me a moment to consider what I wanted before fishing out my credit card and slamming it on the table. It was my emergency card, given and paid for by my dad. Since he had a hand in ruining my life, he might as well have a hand in helping me forget it, even for one night. 

"Open a tab," I said with a broken voice. "Give me your hardest drink. Double and neat."

The bartender grabbed the card while scanning my face with a scrutinizing look. "Hard day?" 

"Husband cheated on me. I want to forget about it, even for a night." I confessed, unprompted. Why not? My shame was already out there for all to see. It had been out there before I was even aware of it. In a sea of elaborate and eccentric clothes, my plaid shirt and denim jeans may have seemed dreary and uninteresting, but I had never felt more naked and shamed in my life. 

_Oh, but now_ , the singer continued before the high pitched, chorused voices of the dancing swans-dressed men sang in one, fast, uniform chant; _I don't find myself bouncing home whistling buttonhole tunes to make me cry_. 

The bartender had placed a clear glass with a dark liquid in front of me, before placing a small, white pill beside it. I had looked up at him in surprise, not even getting a chance to ask before he quickly answered my inquiring gaze. 

"If you really want to forget. At least for a night." He said simply before walking away. 

I stared at the two things for a moment while the people on the stage sang and danced. By the time their melodic chant had finished, I had already swallowed both things on the table in one gulp. I held on to the bartender's words like a promise. As the drink burned down my throat and lit a fire in my chest, the King sang. As I waited for the pill to make me forget, the hairy swans danced on stage, their movements appearing like shadows surrounding the King. 

_No more I love you's_. _The language is leaving me_. The King sang as I downed my quickly refilled glass. I motioned for more. The bartender gave me a quick indiscernible look before pouring me another drink. On stage the swans began showering the King in a flurry of confetti, the little flakes of paper slowly drifting onto the listening audience. 

_No more I love you's_. _Changes are shifting outside the words_.

The musical beat in the air changed, picking up speed and melody as I slowly lost count of the number of drinks I had consumed in a very short amount of time. I had downed a few more drinks before they continued on with their song. 

I turned around and looked to the stage in wobbly, staggered steps. I barely noticed briefly steadying myself on a stranger's shoulders, who smiled and giggled in my face, as I made my way slowly into the middle of the floor. I think I may have stumbled across several wings and frilly tutus, as well one confused looking, frog-like woman. 

_The lover speaks about the monsters_. The swans on the stage whispered to the audience with exaggerated, conspiratorial hand gestures. It seemed mesmerizing to me that their wings all of a sudden appeared to be old, leathery skin, dusted with hair. 

_I used to have demons in my room at night_. The King declared to his people almost proudly, the spotlight turning a gentle red as the background began to shine an odd, twinkling, silver light. My body swayed to the beat, I suspected. It was either me, or the room that moved. I didn't really mind whichever one it was.

_Desire, despair, desire_... _so many monsters_. The King explained in song, reaching out into the dark with his hands. Several swaying people tried to reach for him listlessly too, as I studied the little rays of light that began to line the room. Blurred little colourful rays that smeared my vision into a water-colour painted streak. I began to sway with the figures that surrounded me, as I dipped my skin into the painted lights. 

_Oh, but now_... the swans pushed themselves forward, towards the audience once more. Their large, feathered and decorated faces zooming into our vision. Their little beaks surprisingly mouthing human words; _I don't find myself bouncing around whistling my conscience to make me cry_. 

_No more I love you's_. The King cried in song as I leaned into the arms of a painted fairy, engulfing me in sparkling, luminescent wings. _Language is leaving me_.

_No more I love you's_. _The language is leaving me in silence_. 

I was aware of gently caressing hands digging into my body, pulling out dark little wisps from the depths of my bones. The caressing hands left rainbow painted streaks on what was my skin, undulating like soft, ocean waves. The music was taking form, changing into a warm embrace that filled the room. 

_No more I love you's_. _Changes are shifting outside the words_.

In the edges of my consciousness, the King was fighting against a dreary shadow that threatened to engulf the swans. But the rainbow wings from the people flapped and blew it away. I cheered and laughed with the people as the swans rejoiced on stage. I celebrated with the fairies who showered me in warm little kisses, leaving love on my skin. 

Smell took shape and formed into joy, overwhelming my senses with an astonishing amount of peace. It was an odd sensation, being aware of your own racing heart while never having felt so calm. While basking in the shapes and smells that embraced me, I gave them a piece of myself back. I stripped dark little colours form my skin and took in the seeds of joy the fairies offered. It tasted of salted candy in my mouth, and felt like taffy as it seeped into my being before vanishing into my soul. 

_No more I love you's!_ I distantly heard the King declare in song as the fire in my chest roared brighter, fed by a sweet, burning fuel. 

_Language is leaving me_. The King confessed to his kingdom. I took in what he discarded and welcomed it with open arms. The words enveloped me in complimentary chants and whispers that seeped into my muddled consciousness.

_No more I love you's_! The King declared again, his echo having moved to another side of the long, bright, hall. 

_The language is leaving me in silence!_ The King cried as he wiped his mouth with the back of his delicate hands, smearing his painted face red while the swans laughed. 

I danced to the beat in the light, tasting salty little kisses on the wind. Invisible little fairies fluttered about me leaving favours inside my being, warming and feeding the roaring fire. 

_No more I love you's_. The King stepped into blue, the jewels on his body sparkling in the moving light. He pounded on his chest and motioned for the sky as the fairies pled to the sky with him. The hallways around me narrowed into a corner, settled in between winged arms that held me down on the ground. Or I held them from floating away. I pulled them into colours, wanting more and more to feed the slowly fading fire in my chest. 

_Changes are shifting outside the words_.

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. 

_Changes are shifting outside the words_.

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. 

I was flying, thrusting into the air. There had been and there was joy inside of me. I let it lift me up to fill me with that warm flame that stirred our song that echoed in the darkly painted light. 

_No more I love you's_!

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. 

_Language is leaving me_!

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. 

_No more I love you's_! _Changes are shifting outside the words_. 

_Do be do be do do do_ , _oh_. 

_Outside the words_.

I let the King's words and the swans' songs fill me with their words, desperately desiring any promised change that kept me in this light. But as the song faded in the distance, so did the light, my consciousness crashing into still shores. 

My next memories was of my burning throat, painfully parched, and the heavy pressure that throbbed in my abdomen. Every muscle in my body ached and pleaded to stay in place, but my bladder screamed otherwise. My eyelids were still heavy, shut tight by choice as any cracks in the skin exposed me in burning light. 

"You finally up?" A distant echo tried to reach into my consciousness. Mustering as much effort as I could manage despite the protestation from my eyes, I opened and exposed them in the searing glow of artificial light. I turned away from the lamp towering above me on the bedside, revelling in the dimmer, indirect glow from the other side. A shape seeped into my awareness and I slowly looked up and into the eyes of a dark skinned man with beautiful, seamless, complexion and a spandex covered head. In his hands he held a steaming cup of something. "Drink?"

I breathed out a deep sigh before forcing myself up into a sitting position on the soft bed. I settled my back on the headboard before taking the drink from his hands, quickly taking a deep swallow. I almost coughed it all out the moment the taste of the liquid registered in my brain. 

"Keep drinking," he said evenly. "It'll help with the hangover. It's good for you." 

I watched him walk away, his thin and colourful nightgown swaying behind him with every movement. He wore boxer shorts underneath, but wore tall stockings on his legs. He settled in front of a dresser with a tall mirror lined with bright, shining, bulbs of incandescent light. 

"How much do you remember from last night?" He asked a little too loudly before marking his face with a powder puff. 

"Nothing." I replied with a hoarse breath. I winced before forcing myself another drink of the vile concoction in my hands. "You sure this isn't poisonous?" 

"Why would I bother? You did a good job trying to do that all yourself last night. And then some." He pointed out with a hint of an attitude as he powdered his face, looking at me through the mirror. He put down the powder puff in a small ivory case before tapping his sharp chin with well manicured fingers. "Is there someone I can call?"

I considered his question for a second before shaking my head, taking another drink from the concoction that I had quickly gotten used too. My head throbbed, my muscles were sore, as my eyes continued to numbly burn in their sockets. 

"Do I look as bad as I feel?" I asked, wincing as I tried to move out of the bed, before settling into a hunched position over the side. 

"You look like shit. Considering the things you did last night, I'm not surprised." He said, still studying me in the mirror. "I can call your wife? Husband? Partner? Friend?"

It took me some time before I could respond, spending more time trying not to heave everything out of my body onto the stranger's bed. It was only then that I noticed my naked body. I was covered in glitter and colourful things that might have been paint, but several were oddly coloured and far too crusty to be that kind of liquid. 

"Did we?" I asked, looking over at the man grooming on the table. 

"No." He said evenly, raising a stark eyebrow in my direction. "You did. We didn't. Did all of that make you feel better?"

I steadied myself on a bed post as I tried to stand, and every muscle in my body groaned with the effort. I felt sticky, sore, and gross. The smell of me had finally seeped into my consciousness to my utter horror. 

"I don't even remember anything about last night. Or anyone." I said, still trying not to topple over from my groaning bones and sore muscles. 

"Seems like a waste. Drinking and fucking around to forget only to forget drinking and fucking around." He turned his whole body to me, crossing his legs at the thighs. "Is there a parent I can call?"

"No!" I snapped before wincing in pain at my own voice. At seeing his affronted face, I quickly apologized. "Sorry, no. I'm fine. I'll be fine."

"Are you really?" He asked, studying me with sharp eyes. I didn't answer and worked instead to stretch my body into some reasonable amount of comfort. He pointed to a brightly lit, half opened door behind him after watching me stretch. "The bathroom's just right down there. I put some clothes in there that you can use. I'm pretty sure I got your size right."

"Where are my clothes?" I asked, suddenly feeling self conscious about my nudity. 

He smirked teasingly at my sudden bout of shame. "You weren't that shy last night."

"I thought you said we didn't..." I began but didn't finish the sentence, motioning with my hand instead. 

"We didn't. You did. To whomever and whatever you could get your hands on, or would let you." He explained with a disapproving look. "It was after I noticed the sixth drink and the third scrubby looking man that you rode in the hallway like it's a fucking rodeo that I decided to intervene."

I closed my eyes and winced at the explanation, suddenly feeling all too conscious about my sore anus. "Oh my god."

"I don't usually butt into other people's business, but you were a special fucking case. Emphasis on the fucking." He said dryly, eyes narrowing in disapproval. "I've never seen anyone not give a fuck about anything as much as you last night. Is that a regular thing? 'Cause I'm not your fucking mama and I'm not planning on doing that again." 

"It wasn't, _isn't_ , a regular thing," I insisted before slowly walking towards the bathroom. 

"Mhm," he muttered with attitude before turning back to the mirror. "You might want to book something with a doctor later. With the scrubby guys you were with last night, who knows what you caught." 

I shuffled into the bathroom without a word, shame flushing my skin a radioactive red. 

The bathroom was astonishingly spacious and tidy. There was a large, deep, tub with sliding doors and a rain-showerhead at the far end of the bathroom, past a long marble sink and a large mirror. I stumbled over to the comfortable looking toilet and emptied my bladder, as well as other parts of my body, with relief before moving to tackle the many knobs and levers in the complicated shower stall. I tried to ignore the implications of last night for the moment, instead choosing to wash myself of it's remnants. I felt tremendous relief once that hot water poured over my sore, sticky skin. I relished the heat at that moment, looking up and let the hot, clean, water wash a night I couldn't remember and couldn't help but already regret. I soaped myself several times, scrubbing at the skin, but failed to erase all of the marks that had been left behind. The slight, not obnoxiously unpleasant, throbbing in my ass continued throughout my washing.

By the time I had finished, I stumbled over to the neatly folded pile of clothes on a small, thin, table next to a padded loveseat. Despite being a stranger's clothes, I felt better being clothed, even if it was just in a plaint t-shirt and long, grey, sweatpants. 

"There's food downstairs. Just out the door, down the stairs, and to the room on the right." He explained the moment I got out of the bathroom, not bothering to turn away from the mirror while brushing his eyelashes. 

"Um, do you know where my stuff are?" I asked awkwardly. 

He pointed nonchalantly to the far bedside table before turning his attention back on his reflection. "Wallet and phone is over there."

"My credit card is probably still at the club." I muttered. 

"Well I'm going back there in about an hour to get read for a show. It's not far, you can tag along." He explained while gently brushing a scarlet red wig.

"So early?" I asked, surprised. 

He turned to me with a sharply raised eyebrow and an incredulous tone. "Honey, it's five in the afternoon." 

"What day is it?" I asked. 

"Friday." He answered before turning his attention back on the wig. 

I cursed under my breath at the realisation that I had lost a whole morning and missed several classes in the process. I shoved my wallet into a pocket and checked my phone, pleasantly surprised to find that it had been recharged. I threw a glance over my shoulder and smiled lightly to myself before checking the missed messages. 

Three missed calls from Derek and a few texts from the pack about nothing specific. I cleared the notifications before turning back to...

"Sorry, but what's your name again?" I asked, rubbing the back of my head awkwardly. 

"Anastasia." He replied, puckering his lips after applying a healthy amount of red lipstick. 

"I'm Stiles." I replied. 

I stood there for a moment, not knowing how to voice my next question without sounding like an awkward jackass.

"Um, this is awkward, but I need to check some school stuff online. Do you have a computer I could use, Anastasia?" I asked again, feeling all too conscious about doing so. 

"Use the one in my office across the hall. It's on and not locked. Go ahead." He said nonchalantly. 

I stopped in my tracks before heading out the door, watching Anastasia through the mirror dab the corners of his mouth with a tissue. "Thanks." 

He gave me an inscrutable look through the mirror before smiling softly and nodding. "You're welcome." 

The office itself was surprisingly small. There was only enough room for a one shelf of books and a small desk with a computer at the far end beside a large, floor to ceiling window. I quickly logged online to my university account and sent a quick email to several professors, apologizing for my absence and inquiring about office hours for a chat. When I was done, I threw a glance at my phone sitting on the table top and drummed restless fingers on the hard desk. I tapped my foot a few times before opening an incognito page and logged onto my OnlyFans account. 

There was only one new update on my feed, from SourWolf's account. The thumbnail was Derek sitting in our bedroom, staring sadly at the camera. I watched the image for a moment, various voices arguing in my head about what to do. In the end curiosity won, as he usually does. Moving to gently close the door of the room, I made sure to lower the volume at a reasonable level before playing the video, my heart pounding in my chest. 

"Hi Stiles." The video began to my surprise. Derek was fully clothed in one of his plain, black, Henley's, with a bit of stubble on his face. I had always been envious of Derek's ability to grow stubble overnight. 

I leaned back in my seat, bringing my hand to my face and started chewing on a finger nail. I forced my foot to settle down, stopping the incessant tapping after I had noticed. With a quick glance at the closed door, I turned my attention back on Derek's video. 

"I fucked up. I've got no one to blame but myself. You were right. You were always right. I'm sorry for saying those things. No, not that. I'm not sorry having said those things, but I'm sorry at the fact that I should have said those thing a lot earlier. I shouldn't have lied. I shouldn't have waited. I should have told you all of this much sooner. I should have shared this with you, all my insecurities and my worries. I should have told you... everything, from the start. I'm sorry for being incapable of that. I'm sorry for being a poor husband. Especially with you. You deserved better. You _are_ better. I'm a selfish man who did selfish things. I am sorry for that and you deserved so much more than the selfish man that you have. And you do. You have me. I am yours. I want to be better. I can _be_ better. If you give me a chance. Please, give me chance. Call me back. I love you." 

The video ends with Derek sighing heavily at the camera, before leaning over to press a key on the keyboard. It took me a long moment before realising that I had been tapping my foot wildly again. I forced myself to stop and removed my fingers from my mouth, the nail now jagged and torn from my mindless chewing. I turned my eyes to my phone and listened to the voices in my head arguing about what to do next. 

Was there sincerity there? 

Did I appreciate this apology? I deserved it, I liked to think. 

But did he even deserve me listening to that? 

The fact that he had uploaded that on his OnlyFans account must have meant something. He must have known that I would see it. I couldn't help but wonder if it was some sort of grand gesture for him, uploading an apology video for all his 'fans' to witness and see. My busy mind was quickly jarred by the sudden buzzing of my phone. Out of habit, I quickly answered without even checking who it was. 

"Hey, so I need you to go to Justine's in San Francisco and send me a few bottles of their moisturizer. My arms are getting really bad dry skin. I could swear I'm turning into a Kanima." Lydia prattled in one quick breathe before sighing heavily on the other end of the line. "What the hell, send me a box of it. It can be a really early Christmas present." 

I don't know how long I was quiet after she had finished speaking, my emotions rattled by the video and suddenly hearing her voice, talking about such mundane things. It was a distractingly disconcerting contrast. 

"Stiles?" She asked, bringing me back to my mind. 

I breathed out evenly before speaking back. "Did you know?"

"Stiles?" She asked again, and I could hear the confusion in her voice. 

"Did you know, about Derek?" I asked. 

"What about Derek? Is everything alright?" There was surprise in her voice, and my mind swirled with thoughts about what every inflection could mean. 

Is that hitch in her voice indicative of a lie? Was she really confused? Did she really not know? Should I go into more detail? But if she didn't know... did I want her too? Did I want Lydia to know how stupid I had been? Did I want to expose such a stupid, embarrassing aspect of my life to someone I knew? 

"Stiles!" She snapped over the phone, her voice clearly irritated. "What about Derek? What's going on?" 

A loud, deep, grumbling in my stomach gave me the excuse I needed to end the call. Pinching the bridge of my nose to stopper the grief welling to surge out, I replied in an even voice. "Nothing. Never mind. Look, I'm about to have dinner. So I'll talk to you later. Bye." 

I quickly ended the call and turned off my phone before leaning my elbows against the table. I wiped my face with my hands and tried to calm the voices raging in my head. I didn't want to go down this road. Not now. Not while I was in a stranger's home. Not after I had spent the better part of the night having my heart broken, and then trying to bury that pain in an unmemorable night. Wrong word. Not much unmemorable as much as I literally could not remember. But did I want to? If the headache, the dry mouth, the tender dick, and the sore anus were any consideration, I might not want to. What did I accomplish by choosing to partake in such a reckless and forgettable night? 

Shaking my thoughts from my head, I closed all the windows and shut down the computer before making my way downstairs. Having decided to take Anastasia up on his offer, I entered the room he had mentioned only to be greeted by many inquiring faces, one of whom seem to have stopped mid sentence. I stared at all those faces like a deer caught in headlights, silent and still while my stomach formed its own mind and quickly located something delicious laid out on a long table at the other side of the room. 

"Can I help you?" A woman with long, curly, hair and a long, brown, blouse asked. 

I pointed up the stairs and at the table in quick succession, trying not to stumble over my words. "Anastasia said there was food. I just want food."

"Okay. The food is for the meeting." The woman pointed out. 

"Okay. But, um... she said I could have some?" I replied, throwing quick, longing, glances at a plateful of strudels. 

"It's for the meeting." She reiterated. 

"So that's a no." I said evenly, not really asking. 

"It's not a no. You can have some if you join the meeting." She said with a kind smile, pointing to a vacant seat at the far end of the circle. 

With another quick glance at the table spread, I nodded my head and moved into the room, closing the door gently behind me. As I quietly moved and made myself a plate, the conversation continued in the circle. 

"So you were saying, Jenny?" The woman prompted a girl wearing a tie died tank top and braided hair. 

"Yeah, I dunno." Jenny said. "I feel better, having left. I don't think there was anything there for me anymore. Nothing good anyway. But it's hard, you know? Going someplace completely different and not knowing anyone is scary. But I feel better. I really do. But sometimes, I can't help but miss it. Miss him. Miss all of them."

"That's really good. Change can be difficult and intimidating," The woman replied as I made my way to a vacant seat. I began to chew, a bit louder than I probably could have managed, as she continued. "But it is important to recognize the worth of that change and to hope for something better than what you've had. It's hard having to change habits that you've settled into for so long, isn't it?" 

I only half paid attention to the group, focusing instead on the food in my plate. I was intent on feeding my hangover away when the woman turned her attention to me. Everyone had already turned towards me and were studying me when I had realised I had missed her question. 

"Sorry?" I asked through a mouthful of strudel, swallowing a large piece in one go and almost chocking on it. I slammed my chest with my fist before asking again. "Sorry, what?"

"What about you?" She repeated. "How are you?"

"Oh, I'm fine." I replied with a forced smile and an enthusiastic nod. "I just spent the night at Anastasia's. Upstairs. Nothing sexual. Just, sleeping." 

The woman was just nodding patiently at my reply when a thin guy to my right laughed out loud. 

"Yeah, you were pretty hammered last night." He laughed in a semi-deep voice and a vaguely southern drawl. 

"Was I? I don't really remember." I laughed awkwardly, wiping my fingers on my shirt, suddenly all too conscious of the enormous amount of food in my plate and my appearance. 

"Do you always drink to a point that you can't remember?" The woman asked in response .

"What? No." I denied with an awkward laugh, starting to feel a blush bleeding under my skin. "That was... last night was a total exception. I don't drink that hard. Usually. Like at all."

"Man, you were so fucking high too." The guy explained, disbelief clear in his voice. "You grabbed me and we made out for a bit before you moved onto someone else."

"Oh my god. I'm so sorry." I apologized with horror, not remembering a second of it. "Dude. I didn't mean. I mean, like, I don't remember. I'm so sorry if I..."

He laughed at my discomfort before smiling wildly. "Jeez, calm down. It's fine. I liked it. Kinda disappointed you walked away. But thanks for apologizing anyway." 

"Does that excuse that, though?" I heard Jenny ask softly under her breath.

Not knowing what to say, the awkwardness was broken by the woman asking another question. 

"Do you always use alcohol and drugs as you did last night?" The woman pressed with a gentle look on her face. 

"What? I said no." I insisted, suddenly feeling hot under the collar. "Extraneous circumstances. I'm better now." 

"Why do you think that?" She followed up. 

"Why are you asking?" I retorted a bit aggressively. 

"'Cause it's a fucking support group, you idiot." An angry looking woman with a nose ring pointed out. 

"Try not to use that kind of language here." The woman pressed firmly with a gentle voice, waiting until the other woman blushed and apologized to the entire room before turning back to me. "This is a free space. My name is Anna. I'm here to help moderate everyone's thoughts. Whatever people feel like they want to share. Some people just need a space to articulate themselves with others so that they can get another perspective on whatever's on their mind."

"I'm good." I replied evenly, shoving a piece of buttered bread into my mouth. 

"Dude. We're all fuck ups." The angry woman announced, before seeing Anna's response at her use of language one more. "Screw ups, whatever. Yeah, language is important, I know. Anyway. We don't know you. Like, we don't know you enough to judge. So whatever you're into, we've probably done worse."

"Okay, I wouldn't have really put it that way..." Anna said before the laughing man interrupted. 

"Seriously. We have. Drugs," he said, pointing to himself before pointing out random individuals in the room. "Alcohol, violent depression, abuse, criminal behaviour, anti-social behaviour, abuse, abuse, alcohol, drugs." 

"Gavin!" Anna snapped as everyone in the circle surprisingly nodded nonchalantly at his explanation. 

"It's fine. It's true." The angry, nose ring woman added with a stern voice. "You're not obligated to say anything or even stay. But if you wanted to, this would be the group for it." 

I looked around at all the faces around me and took in all of their unfamiliar faces. As Anna reprimanded Gavin and the angry woman one more, I took in the truth of their words. I didn't know them. They didn't know me. I could say anything. I could just be that random, crazy guy in their memories. That crazy guy who made up stories for a bite to eat, crashing their support group after an alcohol and drug fuelled night. 

"I'm so fucking confused." I confessed, staring at the ground after making the choice to speak. What was left to lose? My story? I didn't want it anyway. What was the use of keeping this story inside and holding on to it? Clearly bottling it up didn't work. I fed it drugs and alcohol for a night and I ended up without memories and possibly STDs from dubiously consensual sex that I couldn't remember. "And so damn _angry_." 

"About what?" Anna asked. 

I looked up and into her eyes, peeking at everyone's faces around me. There was something disconcertingly reassuring about the sight of people quietly observing you, waiting for you to speak, and actively listening to what you had to say. 

"My, uh," I began to say when my voice broke. Clearing my throat, I forged on. "My husband cheated on me. Was cheating on me for a while. I found he had an OnlyFans account." 

"Fuck." The angry woman said. 

"Chris." Anna reprimanded her sternly, raising her hand from speaking further. 

"Sorry." Chris said, making a motion to zip her lips. 

"Um, yeah. Fuck." I muttered before continuing on. "Turns out he's been sleeping with a lot of people behind my back. And it's all on film for the world to see."

"That must have been difficult, coming into that kind of knowledge out of the blue." Anna said gently, urging me on with a commiserating expression. 

"I know he did it for the money. At first, probably. We're not loaded. But we weren't struggling as much as we could be. So... he says he did it for me. But," I said before trailing off, not knowing the words to use. 

"But it's fucked up." Gavin replied for me. 

"Yeah. It's fucked up." I agreed, thinking back on all things that had happened in such a short amount of time. I thought about all of the confessions and the realizations and wondered what it amounted to. But the reality was that it wasn't a short amount of time. Not really. The problem started a long time ago and I was just too ignorant of everything. "I feel so fucking stupid." 

I leaned over and put my head in my hands as I thought back on everything that I had discovered in the past few days. 

"I feels so. Fucking. Stupid." I said through gritted teeth, my eyes shut tightly. "It's stupid that I didn't notice anything. He changed his fucking wardrobe. He had stuff _in_ our apartment that would have raised a red flag with _anyone_ else. Did I just ignore them? Was I just that oblivious? Did I really not care that much? Or was I just that stupid? I don't understand how I could be so fucking oblivious and stupid." 

I leaned back and wiped my face exhaustedly with my hands, resisting the urge to pound my fists into my temple. I moved the plateful of food from my lap, relocating them underneath my chair, having suddenly lost my appetite. I turned over my hand and studied the lines on my palms, tracing them with my eyes, resisting the urge to clench them into fists and punish my stupid, oblivious body. 

"I can see perfectly fine, but I guess I was just that blind." I sighed. "We hadn't had sex in a while, yes. But I was busy. Maybe I could have made more time. Maybe I wouldn't have found out so late. I wouldn't have noticed too embarrassingly late that my husband wasn't the man that I married anymore. He had a fucking piercing that I had never seen before. He got a fucking tattoo. You know how fucking hard it is for him to get a tattoo? He has one!"

I had exclaimed to the group with frustration, catching myself before elaborating even further. It wasn't that we lived our lives at different hours of the day. We still saw each other at the same time on the weekends whenever he was home. I wondered when was the last time I saw him naked without that new tattoo. When did he get it? I supposed that didn't matter as much as the how and why. I knew the people looking at me now wouldn't be able to understand. So I chose to share things that they would instead. I didn't share the amount of fire required to leave a mark on Werewolf skin. That would be crossing the lines of madness more than I, probably, already had. 

"He told me he fucked a guy I thought was my friend. He fucked strangers. He fucked this asshole TA from my class." I said bitterly. "He slept with my dad." 

I rubbed my eyes with my fingers at the confession, hearing a surprised gasp from somewhere beside me. I laughed exhaustedly at the reaction before facing the group with what must've been a maniacal smile. 

"The night before our wedding day." I added to surprised gasps. 

"Holy shit." Gavin said as Chris exclaimed, "goddamn!" 

"That guy's a fucking asshole. This is some Steve Wilkos shit. Damn!" Chris said with disbelief. Everyone nodded in agreement. 

I laughed bitterly at their comments, fully understanding their reaction to my confession. 

"How did you feel when you found out?" Anna asked.

"Like my heart had been ripped out." I said. "I could kind of... I almost could argue the other stuff and push it to the side, you know? I could have justified it. My husband's hot. Like really, fucking, attractive, muscular piece of man meat sort of hot. I could have maybe understood him finding something in someone else other than me." 

Did that confession or realization make it better? He would still have been cheating. I would probably still have been hurt. It would probably have still hurt. I stopped and tried to think back on the past few days and how they made me feel. It took me longer than it probably should have to confront Derek. Why? I couldn't deny being turned on during those moments... could I? Could I pawn off some of the blame and embarrassment to my fucked up, teenaged libido? I was still allowed to be immature at nineteen, wasn't I? 

"I actually thought it was kinda hot. You know?" I confessed, and even I could hear the embarrassment and regret in my voice. But I trudged onward. "I'm _nothing_ like those guys. I'm a scrawny dude, I admit that. I'm nothing like that..."

"You're fucking hot." Gavin piped in suddenly, disagreeing vehemently with my words. "Why do you think I let your drunken ass neck me at the club?" 

"You'd be my type if I was straight." Chris agreed. 

I laughed lightly at the comments. "I wasn't fishing for a compliment." 

"Well you got it, so just fucking take it." Chris snapped as if she were stating the obvious. 

I laughed again, a bit harder this time. It was such an absurd things - to feel flattered and ashamed all at the same time. 

"But I wasn't like them." I said quietly once the laughter in my heart faded. "These were the guys I always thought would end up with Derek. Or a woman like Kate. I've seen his type. I wasn't it."

"Do you think he wouldn't have cheated if you looked like those other men?" Anna asked. 

I considered the question for a whole minute before answering in a breathless whisper, "no." 

"What changes could you have made in your life to have stopped all of this?" Anna asked. 

I looked at her and answered quickly, having had the answers in my head ever since I had found out. "I could have paid more attention. I could have been there more. I could have talked to him about stuff like... our finances and feeling lonely. We were here alone and away from everyone. I could have spent more time with him. I could have insisted on a cheaper place so we would maybe have had more money. I could have put out more. I could have paid attention. I could have fucking loved him more!" 

I was almost yelling at the end, my voice speeding up in a seemingly maniacal bluster, my heart pounding in my chest. The others watched me quietly, their faces a mixture of impassive and pitying. It embarrassed me. I hated it. 

"And what changes could he have made to have stopped all of this?" Anna asked. 

I stilled at her question, turning it over in my mind. What _could_ Derek have done to stop all of it? 

"He could have talked to me." I pointed out one of the thoughts that had crossed my mind but seemingly always flittered away, distracted by some other seemingly more meaningful aspect of the betrayal.

"He didn't." Anna said without inflection, not as a question or a statement as much as verbal acknowledgement that the thought existed. She had left room for me to agree or deny the words she had spoken.

I shook my head. "He could have gotten another job that paid better than construction. Instead of doing OnlyFans."

"He didn't." She repeated.

"He could have jacked off instead of fucking other guys. He could have _not_ fucked my fucking father." I continued bitterly. "He could have let me in. He could have _tried_. He could have demanded that I try harder. He could have pointed out if he wasn't happy. He could have _not_ asked me to marry him. He could have let me leave on my own!"

"He didn't." She repeated. 

"He came with me." I whispered. "He keeps on saying he loves me. But he keeps on hurting me. I've told him that. He knows it now. But he kept saying things that hurt me anyways."

I thought of his apology video, his confession to his audience about his indiscretion. His acknowledgement of regret and remorse and wondered more than ever about what it meant to me.

"He uploaded another video today. He apologized online. He confessed about being wrong. That he hurt me. He apologized." I pointed out, trying to think of Derek's exact words but failing. But I could remember the remorse. There _was_ remorse, wasn't there?

"How does that make the problem better?" Anna asked. 

"What?" I asked, confused by the question. 

"He still fucked other guys, dude." Chris pointed out evenly. 

"But maybe he won't now that I know. Or maybe he'll be honest about it. Maybe he'll be more willing to control himself now." I said more to myself, giving voice to the more unattractive thoughts in my head.

"But he did before. He could still again. But that was fucking dangerous." Gavin explains. "For you I mean. He could have gotten STDs and passed it on to you. He could literally have made you sick or even killed you."

I shook my head at his proclamation, wanting to refute his words but stopped. I realized that I wasn't actually sure. It was true that Derek wouldn't have been able to contract a human disease due to his Were's constitution, but could he have carried it and passed it on? I thought back to everything I had ever read and researched about werewolves and realized it wasn't really a topic that had every crossed my mind. 

"Oh my god." I groaned with frustration and embarrassment at a question that had never crossed my mind. I realized that I had never really had to worry about it. Until recently Derek's betrayal was an impossibility to me. I never thought I had to worry about my Werewolf husband passing on a disease to me due to his infidelity. "He didn't know."

"Like hell he didn't. He's not fucking immortal." Chris scoffed. 

He kind of effectively was. 

"And fucking you dad is screwed up, man." Gavin added, stating the obvious. 

"So what am I supposed to do?" I asked pleadingly, if not a bit angrily at their seeming acknowledgment of the obviousness of the situation. Although I knew they weren't meaning too, they had made me feel even more foolish than I already did. 

"Dump his ass." Chris said as if she were stating the obvious. 

"It's not that simple." I argued wilfully. 

"Yeah, it is." She said dryly. "You call him up, tell him to fuck off, go to a lawyer and get a divorce. Done." 

"Chris!" Anna snapped, her face twisted in frustration. "Stop." 

"No. It _isn't_ that simple." I insisted, much louder this time. "There are other things to consider."

"Like what?" Gavin asked, seemingly genuinely curious about what those things could be. 

"Things!" I exclaimed with frustration, throwing my hands in the air, unable to contain the anger an confusion in my body. There were things like... love? I do, but is it supposed to be this painful? He was a Werewolf? What does that matter? He was my mate? What did that mean? History? He was the first to leave that behind. "I mean..."

I couldn't voice anything reasonable, no matter how desperately I wanted to. 

"You could just leave him." Someone pointed out to my left. 

"I can't." I replied snidely. 

"Why not?" Someone to my right asked. 

"I _can't_." I repeated, frustration in my voice. 

"You won't." Someone else said. 

"He apologized." I pointed out defiantly. 

"Do you still love him?"

"Yes!" I cried out.

"Alright, everyone just stop..." I could hear Anna try to interject herself into the conversation to no avail. 

"Do you think he deserves that?" 

"Why not love him and still leave him?"

"Are you alright?" I faintly heard Jenny asking. 

"Then why did you drink so much last night? Why'd you take the drugs?"

"Are you fucking stupid?"

"Did fucking those people last night make you better?"

"What do you want?" "Why aren't you leaving him? It doesn't make sense." "Why did your dad do that to you?" "Why didn't you notice?" "Dude, seriously, why..."

"I don't know!" I yelled to the room, my eyes shut and my head in my hands.

"That's enough!" A voice called out from across the room with a sharp clap of his hands, plunging the room into a stifling silence. 

Anna was positively verklempt, looking flushed and clutching her heart in her hands. "Okay. We should all come down." 

Anastasia motioned to me with a crook of his fingers. Grabbing the first opportunity to leave, I quickly shot up and walked away, not sparing a glance back. Anastasia closes the door the moment I had stepped out, giving me a look that I couldn't quiet explain. 

"Your clothes are still in the wash. Walk me to the club." He demanded with authority, further highlighted by his startling makeup and ruby, red hair. Even putting on my shoes, Anastasia dwarfed me with her heels on.

"I..." I began to say but was interrupted by Anastasia holding up a well manicured hand. 

"Let's go." She said authoritatively before walking away. I followed, struggling to increase my pace to match her brisk, yet steady, walk. 

The sun had not yet set, but the sky seemed darker. I thought that the walk would take longer, but she quickly turned into a small side street park and sat down on a bench before motioning for the space beside her. 

"Sit." She commanded regally, flipping her red hair over her shoulders before resting her nails on a knee. 

I sat down and closed my eyes, relishing the feel of a sudden breeze that flowed into the little open space. The rustling of the leaves were soothing. 

"They don't know what the fuck they're talking about." She pointed out suddenly. I kept my eyes closed, struggling to keep my attention on the wind. "They don't know what it's like. Especially if you don't know what it's like. It's okay to not know." 

"Is it?" I asked quietly. 

"Nobody really knows what they hell they're doing. We're all just people stumbling our way through life with what we have. Sometimes it helps to just stop after a fall, and take time to appreciate the pain." She explained. 

"Sometimes I don't know what to feel." I confessed. "I'm sick of being confused and tired of being indecisive. I don't know what to do." 

"And you don't have to." 

"Sometimes I hate myself as much as I hate him, even while I know how fucking stupid that sounds." I explained. 

"That's fine. As long as you stop at a certain point and start treating yourself like a fucking friend." She said.

"What did you just say?" I asked with surprise at the surprising comment, reminded of a stray thought I remember I had the night before. 

"Try to be your own friend if there's no one else around for it." She explained. "With all the shit that goes on in my head, I have to stop once in a while to step back and pull myself out of it. I try to remind myself that I don't deserve half as much of the misery that I scream myself that I do." 

She turned and looked into my eyes with a kind smile on her face, resting a hand reassuringly on my shoulders.

"Don't let other people's issues weigh you down in your own pain." She continued. "Look, I don't know you. I don't know your husband. But let me say this it's not original." 

"What?" I asked, surprised at her words.

"It's not, baby." She said. "That should be some comfort to you. They can't _really_ understand your pain as much as you can't _really_ understand theirs. But it doesn't mean it's not meaningful. That it's not valid. That it's not absolutely, gut wrenchingly, painful. We're all built in a way that it's easy to get hurt and to heal. Let it be painful, for a little while. Then hold on to it and remember it. So that you'll know better what to do next time. So it won't hurt as much. So you won't be doing it someone else. So you can find the better."

"So it gets better?" 

"Only if you want it to." She pointed out. "At a certain point, there's less use in the understanding as much as the letting go and moving on." 

"When do I get there?" I asked, curious about when this seeming epiphany would descend. 

"When you're ready." She said cryptically, moving to stand. She fished something out of her purse before handing it to me. "I called the club and they dropped of your card earlier. I have a show at nine, but you can grab me after, if you want. It's just a block that way. You can stay at the house again, if you want. There's a pull out downstairs, actually."

"That's would be weird." I pointed out, taking the card from her hands. "But nice." 

"It's what the House of Anastasia is for, darling." She said with an exaggerated drawl at the end. "Come and go as you need, it's not for me to say. I just have one rule. Don't be an asshole." 

With a dramatic whip of her hair, she walked away with the sharp clicking of her heels.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter is gonna be a bit sexy and mean, but it kinda ends up with Stiles actually acting out and doing something, making decisions that hopefully change his life for the better. 
> 
> And there might be another song in the next chapter. Just another head's up.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles makes a descent into a dungeon, but is pulled back by a familiar siren song.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Watch this music video: https://youtu.be/YCYaALgW80c
> 
> It'll help make sense of the song in the chapter. I'm not sure if any of you might have heard of it. It was only a hit overseas. 
> 
> Also, I'm updating the tags. I have the plot laid out and I just fill in the gaps. The sex is made up on the spot. The sex scenes in this chapter are particularly graphic and intense. Check the updated tags: S&M, watersports, Master & Slave play, puppy play, graphic sex. Sorry if they're not your thing. No I didn't really plan them-ish (kinda, but not really). But I actually did want to write this scene. It's freaking dirty man, like really dirty. I could have made it dirtier... but I held back a lot of stuff (yeah- I edited out a lot of stuff). Did I mention it was mean? 'Cause I think it's mean in so many ways.

I sat in that bench for quite some time, playing Anastasia's words in my mind. I thought about the questions those people had asked of me. I wondered why I couldn't answer. Mhm, rather, I wondered why I couldn't find a satisfying answer. In the grand scheme of things, my issues with Derek were nothing compared to things I had faced in the past. In less than five years I had faced literal monsters. I had put my life on the line countless times. I thought back to the decisive and retrospectively proactive me in my history. I couldn't help but feel shame and frustration at my reaction now. Although I couldn't deny that I felt some satisfaction at having taken my anger out on Derek physically, there was a comparable guilt at not only having done so, but at the fact that I wanted to do it again. I could do it again. It'd be cathartic. 

Dark thoughts started permeating my mind and, honestly, it brought me a bit of glee. Clearly peace wasn't something I could find just feeling the breeze or counting leaves. The counting for control had become a bit dull in comparison to the dark fantasies of revenge. I knew I could do it. It would be easy. Ace and Brody may look far more muscular than I was, but they hadn't been trained by hunters. They ran on treadmills while I ran through dark forests, dodging angry, monstrous things. They lifted weights, while I had lifted unconscious and dead friends during dreadful nights. They probably drank protein powder, while I had tasted blood, sweat, and tears from horrible things that would have driven stronger men mad. 

But I had everyone else with me at that time. I had Scott behind me. I had family, friends, and pack in close proximity. I wasn't alone in a large city surrounded by metaphysical pain and the dangers of my own, broken, thoughts. I had Derek. At least, I had my dad. Thickening about the latter always resulted in sharp, stabbing pain in my chest. 

I stared at the dark, lifeless, phone and for a moment I considered reaching out. If Derek had told the truth, then they didn't know. Except for Peter. But he wasn't really pack. Even then, I felt that Derek shared that morsel of truth in between some lies. Maybe to make himself look better. Before I wouldn't have thought it possible. I wouldn't have thought Derek capable of obfuscating the truth with as much finesse as one Peter Hale. But they were family. Even more was that I sometimes forgot that Derek was a Were living in a human world, having been hunted by Hunters his whole adult life. He was more adept at lying than I usually gave him credit for. It doesn't help that he just looks so much like a dumb jock. But he was my dumb jock. A lying, fucking, dumb jock. 

It would be an easy matter to bring my phone back to life. It was still at full bars when I had turned it off after talking to Lydia. She could help. She was always very good at intrigue and meaningful vengeance. It was one of the things I loved about her. If only she had loved me back. If only we had been together instead. Would she have done the same thing? No. It was difficult for me to picture something like that. But I thought the same thing about Derek. Despite everything we had been through, I thought the same the thing about my dad. The recent turn of events had pointed out that I was a painfully, poor judge of character. 

But considering my careless attempt at trying to feel better last night, I needed help. I turned the lifeless phone in my hands several more times before moving my thumb over the power button. I could still trust them. I knew that I could. All the voices in my mind rattled on about all the different possibilities of betrayal and lies that every single person in my world could have woven. I realized then that perhaps the most damaging thing about Derek's betrayal, was the erosion of trust that resulted between myself and the people I loved. Was it worth it to throw away the meaningful and painful years it took to establish the kind of substantial trust I had established with the pack because of Derek's betrayal? 

The other voices continued to press the other points that stood guard over any meaningful resolution like sentinels at the back of my mind. Deucalion loved his pack. He killed them because of that love for power. The same thing with Kali. Ennis. The Twins. Peter. Those little voices may had been faint all of this time, but now they responded in concert. No longer a whisper but a chorus of voices speaking as one, demanding acknowledgment of a paranoid truth. People had died and killed for that kind of love. There was power to be gained by the breaking of that kind of trust. Derek had torn out my heart. He didn't kill me, but a part of me had wished he would have. Even if the pack loved me? Who's to say they didn't mean to hurt me? 

Some other parts of me wished I had driven the shards of glass deeper into Derek's chest and straight into his heart. My bandaged hand was a constant reminder of that omnipresent and stark desire. After all, time with Chris and a lifetime of being raised by a Sheriff dad taught me how to shoot a man from a respectable distance. A simple, little, twitch of a finger on the right trigger could probably bring me the relief I had sorely desired. 

Or. I could call Lydia. I could call Scott. The latter would probably stop me from making rash decisions. The former would likely join me in enacting them. I had been pacing back and forth like for who knows how long before I had made my decision. But before I could even turn on my phone, a vision of a man across the street caught my eye, and ignited my rage. 

He was talking on the phone, laughing happily and brightly with a casual smile. He was absentmindedly scratching muscular pecs bulging out of a ratty old tank top, while he spoke heartily on his phone. By the time he turned away from me, walking slightly to his left, I was already crossing the street. A few cars might have suddenly stopped and blared their horns at me, but my attention had been supplanted by mindless anger and hate. The man hadn't even been rattled by the car horns, letting out another hearty guffaw during a conversation I could not hear. But I could imagine it. He was probably talking about me. Laughing about me. Derek would have talked to him by now. Wouldn't he have done? They talked. Derek said so himself in that video. Derek had told him things that he might not even had told me. 

The man's call had ended by the time I had reached the other side of the street. He had just pocketed his phone and turned around by the time I had reached swinging distance. There had been more than enough time for the rage to pump enough adrenaline in my system to think past the pain and curl my dominant hand into a hard fist. It was more of a reflex than a decision at that point to put all of my weight in that swing. To my utter joy, my fist connected with his jaw before surprise even registered in his face. It was utter catharsis, watching that body smash into the ground and that head smack onto that pavement. I even registered one of the voices in my head praying for a concussion. 

Then the pain came. Throbbing and burning pain shot through my wounded hand. I cussed out loud and cradled it in my chest before a blur of a body slammed into me, smashing me into the ground. There were indiscernible screams around me as I wildly swung at the figure trying to hold me down. To my surprise, I hit something and the weight on top of me vanished. I managed to stagger to my feet before someone else tried to tackle me again. 

I remember swinging and swinging hard. I remember cussing and cursing as hard as I have ever done in my life even if I can't quite remember what was said. My heart pounded in my chest as wildly as the swings I threw in the air. My breath had been knocked out of me as many times as I seemed to have relieved people of theirs. But the next thing that clearly registered fluently in my mind was a deep, raspy voice telling people to stop and to let me go. 

"Get off him. It's fine." The bearded man said, cradling his jaw, wiping a streak of blood that trickled down the corner of his lips. An obscenely thick tongue darted out to taste it. I snarled at the image, remembering that very tongue had tasted my husband's cock. 

To my surprise, Jack even helped pull the strangers off of me, harshly trying to drive them away. 

"Are you crazy?" One stranger who was trying to keep hold of my struggling body demanded.

"Let him go. I deserved it." Jack said with a smile, wiping the blood from his chin with a hairy, tattooed arm. He reached over and pulled one of the guy's arms from around my throat with ease, giving me enough leverage to break the man's hold on my body. 

I staggered to my feet, breathing hard and deep from the sudden rush of adrenaline and the resulting brawl. I couldn't help but think angrily that if I had been a Werewolf or any kind of supernatural creature, I wouldn't have been this winded so quickly. Why were real human fights, full of emotion and flying fists, so physical draining so quickly? It was barely enough to temper my rage. It didn't help that he seemed to have welcomed it. I felt like I had just sprinted half a mile in a short amount of time. 

"I'm calling the cops." A woman's voice sounded from beside me, her harrowed face hidden behind trembling hands. 

"Don't." Jack repeated with frustration in his voice. 

"You fucked my husband, you son of a bitch!" I yelled angrily before lunging at him again. But more hands reached over and pulled me back, holding me tight. It was only then did it break through my consciousness that a small crowd had surrounded us. 

The woman was taken aback for a moment at my declaration. She turned towards Jack with inquiring eyes and was surprised to find the bearded man nodding in affirmation. 

"Yep. I fucked his husband." Jack declared with open arms, not looking the least bit ashamed. "On video." 

The woman gave him one more indiscernible look before hanging up her phone and shoving it back in her purse. She helped pull a man off the floor before turning to me. 

"How's your hand?" She asked, surprisingly stern.

"Throbbing." I replied evenly. 

"Alright." She declared after helping the man up completely on his feet. Then to my utter surprise, she quickly turned around with a swing of her fist and levelled another punch at Jack, hitting him square on his cheek. It wasn't enough to take him down, but he staggered back nonetheless. 

"Right. What do you need?" She asked me while shaking her hand, her eyes astonishingly intense. The surprise from her punch had distracted me from my anger, and I was suddenly at a lost for words. I just gaped at her reaction, a sudden and drastic shift form threatening to call the police thirty seconds ago. 

"It's fine. We probably need to talk." Jack declared suddenly to my surprise, cradling his jaw once again. "I betcha he has a lot to say." 

"Oh fuck off!" The woman snapped at Jack, and moved as if she was raring for another punch. The man she had helped up was staring at her with bemused surprise, and I think some level of admiration, but quickly reached over and held her back in his arms. 

"Do you want to talk, or not?" Jack asked, nodding at my direction. 

By this point, the hands that had been holding me back had become reassuring pats on my shoulder, Jack's declaration seemingly explaining my sudden burst of violence. 

I considered the question for some time quietly before Jack's next offer decided it for me. 

"I'll buy you a drink. Least I can do." He offered. 

"It's alright." I muttered through gritted teeth, cradling my sore hand against my body.

"You sure?" The woman asked, still looking pissed and ready to thrown another punch. 

"Yeah." I said a bit brusquely, but she didn't seem to have been offended by my tone. 

"Alright." She said evenly, causing the now goofy smiling man to release her from his grip. She turned one more time towards Jack and promptly spat on his face. "Trash."

Then after grabbing the man beside her by his shirt, they both walked away without a backwards glance. That declaration seemed to have been the signal for the other onlookers to disperse. I felt a few more pats on my back and well wishes before only Jack and I stood on our part of the sidewalk, facing each other awkwardly. 

"Drink?" Jack asked, pointing at the building next to us. 

I realized then that we had been standing in front of a pub the entire time. Without hesitation I stomped right in and straight to the bar. The bartender gave me a nod with a complicated looking face, clearly having seen the entirety of the altercation. 

After seeing a familiar looking box on the drink shelf behind him, I pointed out my order. "Jack Daniels. The 27. Double and neat." 

"Fuck. That's the limited release." I heard Jack exclaim behind me. I leveled him a look I hoped was intimidating enough. He quickly raised his hands up in the air and nodded a the bartender. "Sure. Why not. On my tab Billy." 

The moment Billy had finished pouring the drink, I swallowed it without much preamble, causing Jack to grimace in apparent pain.

"Shit, you're not even going to taste it?" Jack asked, affronted. 

"Another one." I nodded at Billy, tapping the empty glass on the table. "If we're talking, I'm going to need it. Fuck it, give me the bottle."

Having been more of a statement than a question, I had already reached over and grabbed it from Billy's hand before either of them could respond. I turned to Jack and inquired our next steps with my body. 

Jack motioned with his finger and Billy promptly offered him an empty glass. He then pointed at the far end of the room, a distance away from the bar, that was bereft of any patrons. I marched to the farthest booth without checking to see if he had even followed. I had settled in my seat and poured myself another glass before Jack had arrived to sit across from me. I studied the dark liquid in the glass intently, my mind muddled by the anger, curiosity, and the throbbing of my wounded hand. 

"You might want to slow down if you still want to talk." He said, pouring himself a drink with the bottle. "It's also a three hundred dollar bottle. So you might as well enjoy it slowly." 

"So you know who I am?" I asked bitterly, trying to resist the urge to drain the glass in front of me of its contents. That and the urge to jump over the table and beat the calm man before me senseless. My hand would probably still heal. Or I could always use the other one. 

"Yeah. Derek's shown me pictures on his phone," he explained, taking a small sip of his drink. "Saw a few at your place." 

"You've been to my apartment?" I laughed incredulously, my foot tapping excessively under the table. "Of course you have."

Jack studied me for a moment while taking a long, slow drink from his glass. He rested both of his hands palms down on the table after settling his glass down on the stained wood, levelling me with a look of surprise. "You really didn't know?"

"What? That my husbands a cheating whore?" I said bitterly before shaking my head. "No. I didn't know." 

"I always thought it was a joke. A story, you know?" He said, causing me to laugh at his description. I wiped that laughter away with another swig of whisky. "I mean, an audience gets off on that kind of stuff? I just thought you guys were open. Most gay couples are around here."

"You sound pretty fucking naive for an old guy." I responded dryly. 

"That's rich coming from you." He said with narrowed eyes. "And I'm not that old. Experienced. But, you're not wrong. I thought it was kinda weird that we hadn't met you. But you were busy. That's what Derek said anyway. Ace too. I didn't really have a reason to think otherwise." 

"But you know now?" I pointed out. 

"There were a few posts that made me wonder. But I thought maybe you guys were just playin' into the cuckold scenario, ya know? Lots of guys build an audience with a story like that on the site. Less than half of them are ever true." He explained. "You get shit like, 'fucking my cousin' or 'fucking my sister's husband', or 'married businessman' and shit like that. Helps get the fantasy going at home. Makes the audience want more. Makes it easier to crank one out."

"People get off on this?" I said with distaste.

"Don't you?" He asked in return. 

"And all that time I just thought we were unhappily married." I muttered under my breath before taking another small sip of whiskey. "Was what you said true?"

"What did I say?" He asked.

I thought back to the video that seemed like so long ago now. But it really wasn't. Just another crazy stupid thing that crazy stupid Stiles did, signing up for porn to jack off on his asshole TA's porn page. Paying for it. Instead stumbling into my cheating husband's life, confusingly and frustratingly getting aroused by it, then eventually broken as the betrayal began to settle in.

Then that was the moment that I remembered I was till signed up for Brody's page. I was literally still giving him money. He might have posted another video of him fucking my husband, and technically I've paid him for it. Shit.

"The post massage video." I said with a raspy voice, relishing the burn of the whiskey on my throat after the sudden realization. "The things you said."

"Ah. Right." Jack nodded as if recalling the memory I had pointed out. "I remember. I thought we were playin' a role, ya know? Inexperienced guy doing porn for the first time. Derek was pretty reserved back then? Usually he wouldn't hang out with us unless Ace was there."

"But he 'hoovered' you down, or something like that." I said numbly, not at all trying that hard to recall that memory. "I remembered you sounding proud."

"Well, yeah. 'Cause it was fucking hot. It wasn't until that week we took in Palm Springs that he got comfortable enough with us." He recalled, sounding a bit fond of the memory.

"Wait, Palm Springs? What are you talking about? He's never been to Palm Springs." I argued, trying to think through my memories of Derek leaving for a week to Palm Springs. "When was this?"

"Ten days actually. Left on a bit more than a week before President's Day, last year." Jack shrugged. 

I counted back to that time in my head, trying to get the times right. "Ten days, so the 8th? No, he was at a job building a house out in Fresno that week. Because the drive was so impractical, he just stayed there for the whole thing."

We had missed the first Valentines of our marriage because of that job. But it paid well and we needed the money. 

"Sorry, bud. He was at a nude resort with us. Figured that the best way to get him to relax was get him out of the city. I actually thought you'd be coming with, but I remember him saying you couldn't get away 'cause of school." He explained nonchalantly, as if he hadn't just dropped a massive lie on my lap. Whether it was his or Derek's was the question. 

I had no reason to trust him. But then again, would this lie be so unusual for Derek? He's already lied about so many things, why not this one too? I remembered that time. Two weekends without my husband, one of which was supposed to be Valentines day. All I got was a fifteen minute call the day of, and a few minutes every other day at night.

Had there been a conversation that could have tipped me off? I couldn't remember much. Except maybe for that one time he did answer my call while he was working. At least I thought at the time he had been working. He was grunting with tremendous effort in between sentences. He had cussed out loud at one point, and a heavy thud sounded in the background. I thought I had caused him to hurt himself, having distracted him from his work with my call. I apologized and hung up. 

"Took him a few days to let his guard down around us. We left him and Ace alone for a bit. Had a drink with him. The nudity helped. Eventually he started coming out of his shell, with us and everyone else in the resort. Man he loved hiking around the woods near the resort naked." He explained while my face was scrunched up with confusion and a rising anger. "He had a bukake for fuck's sake. We thought we'd just hike a bit. There was a river nearby. Thought it'd be a great way to get to know each other first. Find out what makes him tick."

"What?" I asked, confused by the story. 

"But next thing I know, Aarin and him are making out when we set up a spot next to the river. We laid down some blankets and he just got down on his knees, pulled out Ace's cock and started sucking. We all had a turn and then some. The slow burn the first few days was worth it, I tell ya what." He said fondly. 

I was quiet during his story, the idea of which further obfuscated my idea of my lost husband. Too many stories. Too many lies. And far too many truths and half truths in between to fit the reality of things. The only consistent thing was that I was the broken, left over pieces, not allowed a place in the grand picture of things. 

"Honestly, I wasn't really expecting much that week, or even that day. I really thought a hike would just break the ice. But you got this hot guy just takin' load after load, just fuckin' gagging for it. It wasn't just us. A few other guys from the resort stumbled in, and they joined in and Derek just went for it." He continued. "You've probably seen it."

"What?" I asked confused by the question. 

"Well, it's on his page." He explained, as if it were the most obvious thing. "Ace took a video at one point. Right around his second load I think. Before Derek started drinking our piss."

I don't remember my reaction, but my look must have been something to see. Jack just shook his head before shrugging his shoulders at me. 

"Look, I'm just tellin' ya what happened. You got yourself a piggy husband there." He said seriously, emphasising his point with a fat index finger at my face. "Shit, there wasn't any fuckin' that day. But man, it was obscene in the best way possible. Aarin was in heaven. He's a pig too. So he was in cloud 9 at finding a friend, you know? Then you got Ace who's pretty piggy too. They must've drank a gallon of piss and cum between the three of them. We stank sumin' awful by the time we got back. I have to admit, we've had fun." 

My face was in my hands, sweaty and trembling with grief. And perhaps, a bit of arousal. I couldn't get the image out of my face. I hated that a part of me wanted a clearer picture. I hated that part of me that wanted to whip out my phone to watch it happen. It was growing old. Having to juggle the rage and the arousal alongside my grief. I felt like such a monster. 

"I didn't know him at all." I said with a tired voice. "I don't know why I even talked to you? What's the point? Punching you felt so fucking good. But what's the point of this? Why am I doing this? I already know."

"Do you though?" Jack asked.

"What?" I asked in return, wondering what he meant.

"I saw the video this morning. You see it?" 

I looked down at the table, seeing nothing in particular. I fiddled with the old cracks on the surface absentmindedly with a finger. "He was apologizing. He said he was better. Asked me to give him a chance." 

"Are you?" He asked, leaning in towards me, causing me to lean back in surprise. 

I wondered at the question. The truth of it was that a part of me wanted to believe that. A part of me wanted to think it could be better. We've done worse. I've done worse. He's done worse, hadn't he? We've been able to forgive the other things... the unnecessary deaths from bad decisions. The killings and the impossible reviving. Both he and I had forgiven worse indiscretions in our lives. At least... maybe they were worse things. Hell, Scott had tried to kill me multiple times. But I was able to forgive that. I had Derek thrown in jail. A few times. He was able to forgive that too. I was able to separate how it had happened with what Scott had meant to do. Derek was able to separate what happened with what I had tried to do. Once again, the question crossed my mind. Maybe I could separate this too? If Derek stopped. Or if Derek started to let me in?

That group didn't know my life. Anastasia could never understand my problems. This was different. This should be treated differently. My problems were unlike anyone else's. Derek's problems must be too. But, they were still problems. Admittedly, they were problems that were causing me real hurt. If anything, the group and Anastasia had been right about that. Even without knowing of the how and the special circumstances, maybe they did understand the hurt. Do I even understand my own hurt as much as they seemed too? 

"I want to." I confessed quietly more to my drink than to Jack. "After everything I still want to believe in him. But another part, the smarter part of me, wants me to hurt that lying son of a bitch. It's confusing. If I did that, who am I really hurting? The guy I fell in love with? Or that lying stranger? That horny bastard I saw on film? Which one is my Derek?" 

"Do you want to know?" Jack asked suddenly.

"What do you mean? More stories? I think I've had enough." I replied, frustrated all over again. "I can probably just go through his OnlyFans and find everything I need to know. At least I can see him literally doing it. All those things he lied, and lies about, in film. I could probably understand him more from watching those than talking to you. He can't refute that . I mean, how do I even know you're telling the truth? At least with the video, I can see it."

"See it?" Jack smacked the table suddenly with an open palm before pointing at once again. "Alright, I'm gonna help you out. Come with me." 

I narrowed my eyes at him with distaste before emptying the contents of my glass. "Why the hell would I do that?"

"You said that watching will help you understand more, or sumin'." He pointed out as I tightened my grip on my glass. "Well, I can show you why he does that stuff. Why people like that kind of stuff. Why there's a fucking industry built around sex, around a specific kind of sex. Why there's a fucking stereotype about our lifestyle."

"Speak for yourself." I spat out, interrupting his explanation. But he just shook his head and continued. 

"I can show you what he's done. At least some of it. Some stuff aren't on film, that I know off. At least, I don't know if it's in his account. But I can show you what we do sometimes when we're with him." He elaborated.

"Why are you doing this?" I said evenly, a rising anger bleeding into my voice. "Are you saying he's lying in that video? Well, fuck me we'd be agreeing on something. You think I actually believe he's back home and just waiting for me? After everything, I'm not that fucking naive." 

"Not what I'm saying." He said, holding his hands up as a means to placate my rising frustrations. "I'm saying that I can take you to where he goes and show you things that he used to do. Look, you saw the video. Derek said he stopped, but have you ever wondered what he gave up? What he liked to do that he couldn't do with you?"

I remained quiet even after this explanation. The truth of the matter was, I was curious. Some reasons of which, I wished weren't the case. Another was out of morbid curiosity. Other reasons were ones that would help justify my anger and rage. 

"Look, I can show you something better than an edited video. He said that he was stopping to get you back. So if he's telling the truth, the most you'd see is why he liked doing that stuff. Maybe you can get a glimpse of the life that 'stranger' you're talking about lived. He's not the only man in the world who likes sex, _that_ kind of sex, Stiles. You want to understand him? You want to see the things happening instead of me telling you about them? Well then, why not let me show you a bit of his world? What do you have to lose?"

My life? I wondered. I looked at my empty glass before looking him in the eye. "Nothing." 

That's how I found myself following Jack into the dark. The walk was shorter than I expected, it was only a few blocks away until Jack lead me to a back alley littered with trash. It was far too short for me to be able to think long enough to change my mind. Oddly, I found these grimy back alleys comforting. I've killed things in back alleys. Somehow those memories gave me a sense of control. Dark, dank, and dangerous looking alleyways didn't seem so frightening after you've fought a demon in one, and survived. But I suppose it was easier killing and hurting monsters in the dark. They weren't human, after all. Neither was Derek, technically. I guess. 

The sun had set and only the moonlight and the bleeding light from nearby windows shone our path. It was mostly quiet except for a few men in leather that passed by us, throwing us a brief look and a smirk before walking onward. He lead me to a nondescript door down a grungy looking flight of stairs in between two large, industrial sized garbage bins. 

"Okay, so you're definitely out to kill me." I said, stopping at the top of the stairs as Jack walked casually forward. 

"Don't be a fucking pussy." Jack said, smirking. "Do you wanna know more about Derek or not? I thought you wanted to know how he thinks. The answers are right behind that door. So what you wanna do? 'Cause it's no skin off my back. You can turn back now and just walk away. You don't ever have to know. What does understanding bring you, anyway?"

I resisted the urge to grumble to myself like a child, refusing to seem vulnerable in any way in front of him. With steady steps, I followed him past the metal door. But Anastasia's words echoed in my head at Jack's question. What does understanding bring? Closure? A clarity of purpose? A clearer villain I can fight? Something more substantial than a deceptive husband?

"What is this place?" I couldn't help but ask. It reminded me of Anastasia's club, but without the glitz, the glamour, and the excessive neon colouring. The hallway was narrow and lit by a soft, red, light. It was eerily quiet and vacant. 

"You said you wanted to make sense of how he feels?" Jack said before stopping in front of a nondescript metal door and knocking, loudly, three times. "Well Derek boy isn't very good with words. So I figured you might as well see for yourself." 

"I feel like I'm going to get tetanus. Or end up in a Hostel movie. Derek liked this place? Like going here?" I asked with disbelief, hoping it wasn't true.

"Not anymore if he's back home." Jack said as a slit opened on the metal door and a half-obscured faced peered out at us. Jack gave a little nod and hard metal of the door began to scrape and rattle as it opened for us. He repeated his question. "So what's the problem? You just wanted to understand why he likes this stuff." 

He walked in to the other side of the door before turning to look at me, casually asking, "you coming?"

I followed him without a second thought. It was mostly what I figured a sex dungeon would be like, going by the things I had researched online in my teenaged years. Still technically a teenager, even if I no longer felt like one. My problems seemed to have gone beyond the typical teenaged problems. A part of me kind of yearned for some at that moment. Something simple and clean. 

The hallway was wide and long, and in every hundred metres or so there was another heavy metal door with a small window near the top. I looked through the nearest one and found a scantly clad woman wearing a leather harness, whipping an old man locked in barracks. His back and ass had long, red, gashes with a bit of blood. No sound escaped from the other side. 

"Derek went here?" I asked turning back to follow Jack as he walked slowly down the hall. A man was walking on all fours while being lead on a leash by a another man smoking a stogie. The crawling man wore a muzzle and a leather harness, while the handler wore nothing but a jockstrap and a leather jacket. The handler nodded at Jack before continuing on, dragging his 'dog' behind him. 

"He liked coming here whenever he could. Especially since you could do more stuff here that he couldn't anywhere else. During Folsom, sure. A few blocks at the right places. Well, we have a few friends with good gear too. But the best stuff can be found here. And mostly people go here for the atmosphere." He explained before stopping next to a door and opening it with a swipe of a card he pulled from his pocket. He stepped aside and tried to usher me in.

"I'm sure." I mumbled to myself with some distaste at the persistent red light. Although, if I removed myself from the cause of this situation, I would probably be more than willing to see everything. But the context bothered me. After all, all of this was related to my mate's infidelity. 

I hesitated at the door, seeing the dimly lit room inside. At least it wasn't red. Suddenly, all the reasonable words that had been asked and related to me earlier in the day flew out of the window. My conversation with Jack had thrown me for another loop, piquing my curiosity about this aspect of Derek's life.

"Well?" Jack asked again. "Wanna turn back?"

I hesitated only for a second before shaking my head and walking forward. "No."

The room was decorated like a small theatre. There were a row of fold-able seats that were bolted to the ground, each subsequent row a little bit higher than the one in front of it. There were enough seats for about fifteen people, but they were all vacant. In front of the seats was a large window that showed a vacant and sparsely decorated room in the background. There was a sturdy looking table in the corner, a leather swing not far from it, a ratty mattress on the ground, several buckets in one corner, and a glass cupboard full of oddly shaped things. 

"Fuck. It's like a cineplex for the perverted." I muttered under my breath, taking a seat in the middle of the front row. I was all too conscious of the fact that Jack chose to sit right next to me. "Do you have to sit so close?"

"How else am I going to give you commentary?" Jack asked. "I can tell you already have questions."

I frowned at the room. It looked like something out of a gory horror movie. I didn't understand how something like that could turn anyone on. 

"Derek liked this?" I asked. "And he was here, watching this?"

"Not very often." Jack replied to my surprise, before smirking at my clearly confused face. "Not watching anyway. He liked being on the other side." 

Of course. If anything else could be clear about husbands previously secret proclivities, it was that he liked to be watched more than doing the watching. 

"It's about to start." No sooner had Jack said that when the door on the other side of the window opened. 

"Can they see us?" I asked, suddenly worried that the players would see me watching them play. I already felt dirty enough. I didn't want a corresponding witness to my shame. 

"No. One way glass." Jack explained, "can't hear us neither. We could be doing anything in here and they're none the wiser. The other side is meant to be sound proof. Makes it so that while you're in there, all you hear is what you use and each other. No distractions. That place is meant for the players. This is for the voyeurs." 

"But we can't hear them either." I pointed out before a man wearing a leather biker outfit walked in and flipped a switched on the side, brightening the other room. Static buzzed briefly on the speakers in the corners of our viewing room. 

Jack pointed at one as he explained, "there are speakers that lets us hear what's going on in the theatre. The TVs are over there. Cameras are actually set up all over the theatre, allowing for close ups in specific angles. Makes it so you can see everything that's going on. All you have to do is listen, watch, and enjoy the show."

"Who knew it'd be so high tech?" I murmured more to myself than to Jack. 

"People pay a lot of money for sex." Jack replied. "The one who made this place is making bank."

"Derek... pays money to be here?" I asked in a hushed but clearly angry tone.

"Nah. Derek gets in for free." He explained. "He's a player. People pay money to watch. Unless you've played too. They also sell gear and rent out rooms. And some other stuff. There's rooms in the back, in case anyone wants some private time with some of the players without anyone watching."

"But I..." I began before he interrupted me with a shake of his head. 

"You're with me. I'm only giving you a small tour. First show's free." He winked. 

And it indeed was like a show. The biker man began moving things about the room. He started removing some of the things on the shelf and laid them out on a row. There were unusually large, oddly shaped dildos, whips, canes, chains, gags, and all other assorted things that would be too obscene in polite company. The biker man checked the slings before moving to our viewing window and fiddling with his face and clothes. 

"That's PigBoy." He explained as the rat faced man preened at our window. "Like his name says, he's a pig. Nasty as fuck. Always up for a good time. Giving and receiving." 

PigBoy did look the part. After unzipping his leather jacket, he showed that he wore nothing underneath, exposing his heavily tattooed chest. A thick, silver, chain, thicker than any of Derek's, hung loosely down his chest. He turned the moment two more men entered the room leading two other men on a leash, crawling low on the ground on all fours. 

"Aarin is the guy on with the tattoo on his chest. You might've seen him around in Derek's OnlyFans page." Jack explained quietly as the men in the theatre moved about. Aarin was the haughty looking man with an undercut styled into a neat Mohawk. He looked slightly different form that photo I had seen with Derek in the gym. But the body and the face was the same. He wore a pair of assless chaps that highlighted his rotund rear and leather cuffs on his beefy arms and wrists. "The other one is..."

"Brody." I finished for him, recognizing that haughty face. He was wearing nothing but a black jockstrap that could barely contain his manhood. 

"Of course you would know. Kinky son of a bitch, in his own way." He explained. "And those are the dogs for the night." 

The 'dogs' were led to the middle of the room on a leash. Both wore a tank-top-like leather jacket, one red and the other was black, that highlighted their muscular arms and shoulders but covered their bodies snugly. They both wore jockstraps matching their respective jackets, as well as thick grey chains with a lock and dog-bone tags at the end, connected to a long, chain, lead that the handlers held. Both dogs had little gloves on their hands that were bundled into fists, likely helped cushioning their muscles and bones as they moved about on their hands and knees. On both of their asses was a leather tail that wagged about with every slight movement. It was similar, if not the same, as the leather dog tail butt plug I had seen in Derek's drawers. Both of them wore a leather dog mask that obscured their faces except for their eyes, and a hole at the bottom of the leather snout that gave access to their mouths. 

"The one in the red is Ace." I said with a low, dry voice, recognizing him from his easily identifiable tattoos. There on his ass for all the world to see was 'Fuck Me' in large, black, letters. "I shouldn't be watching this."

But I didn't move. I fidgeted in my seat and caught myself opening and closing my fists repeatedly, forcing myself to stop doing so by breathing out a heavy sigh. To distract myself, I pointed at the last dog who I did not know. 

"Who's that?" I asked.

Jack shrugged, his face impassive. "I don't know. I don't know everyone. Doesn't matter though. A dog is a dog. But if you want a name, how about Blackie? Show's about to start."

Just like in a real theatre, the lights in our viewing room dimmed, making the theatre that much easier to see. The men in the theatre began to move about while the two dogs huddled in on the mattress in the middle of the room, backs arched, assess up and tails wagging. 

Aarin took a rough looking switch from the nearby table and moved to Ace's side. He began muttering obscene things that we could hear clearly in the viewing room, before he started tracing the switch on Ace's pale skin. Ace moved his ass towards the feel of the switch, as if he had yearned for it. Then in one swift flick of his wrist, Aarin slashed the air. Ace's grunt of pain echoed in our room while the man arched his body from the impact. 

"Yeah, you like that bitch?" Brody laughed before moving forward to squat in front of Ace. He took a fistful of the man's hair and promptly spat on his dog mask before slapping it with his free hand. "You like that?"

"Yes, sir!" I heared Ace exclaim, seemingly rutting down on the mattress before Brody slapped and asked him again. Ace repeated his answer like a chant, "yes, sir! I love it, sir!" 

"Fucking bitch likes it." Aarin declared with a drawl before striking Ace's rump with the switch once again. I watched Ace's legs rattle for a moment before the man managed to steady himself, jutting his ass out even more. 

On the other side, PigBoy was feeding his bare foot into Blackie's snout. On the monitor, a close up shot of Blackie played as his thick, wet, tongue licked every inch of PigBoy's dirty, bare foot. Blackie sucked in one toe at a time until he had fit in most of the foot in his mouth. Bracing himself on the chair he sat in, PigBoy moved to shove more of his foot in the dog's mouth, causing Blackie's chest to heave with the effort. Blackie's gags echoed in our viewing room, the monitors showing a considerable amount of saliva leaking out from the mask as PigBoy shoved his foot harder into the dog's mouth. Even I knew that the man named Blackie had some measure of control, that he could just back off himself stop the gagging. Instead he seemed to be intent on keeping the foot in, despite the coughs and dry heaving. He even managed to recover after a little while, after a quick little cough to the side, before slowly crawling closer towards PigBoy, bending down and licking the leather boots on PigBoy's other foot. A thick wet tongue began licking the clean leather boots as PigBoy spat several times on Blackie's mask covered head, marking the leather with thick globs of saliva. 

On the other side, Aarin continued slashing at Ace's back and rear with the switch. The sound of the thing hitting skin never stopped making me flinch. At a certain point, I had to turn away and closed my eyes, willing the image of Ace's skin reddening from burning itself too deeply in my mind. But when I had opened them again, I saw Jack staring at me with a haughty smirk. 

"Fantasy's different from reality, isn't it. You should try it on the other side." Jack whispered lowly. 

"No thanks." I muttered before turning back to force myself to watch the scene, increasingly disbelieving that this was something Derek would like. "It's weird. I've seen worse. But this is different from that."

It reminded me too much of Kate, or the hunters in general. I knew Kate liked stuff like this. Gerard did too. Derek told me some of it. Peter told me more. Kate told me the most, taunting me with the things she had done before Derek and I had gotten together. I'm glad Gerard never directly elaborated to me. Even I had my limits. Back then I just viewed them as lies, coming from such duplicitous human beings, I had no reason to believe her. Not fully at least. I thought that Derek had put this behind him. I thought he had wanted to. Had I been wrong? I thought something like this had happened _to_ Derek. I had never considered that it could have been something he wanted. Or still wanted. It never crossed my mind that this could be something that happened with him. 

Brody had moved over to Blackie's side, slapping that dog after every degradation. He then moved to the table with the toys, grabbing a large bottle of lube and a particularly girth-y, and angry looking, red cock. Moving to Blackie's ass, Brody removed the tail before leaning over and giving Blackie's puckering, pulsing, rectum several licks. After shoving his thick thumb into the hole several times, Brody lined up the dildo at Blackie's entrance and began to taunt the dog. 

"You want this cock, baby? Yeah, can you take it?" Blackie whimpered loudly, a high pitched, dog-like sound, escaped from his throat. "Yeah, good boy. Back into it."

At Brody's command, Blackie began to move himself backwards, slowly, onto the large toy. The monitor showed the whole ordeal in great, and frankly too much, detail. Blackie's ass seemed to stretch around the large, red, cock head of the dildo, before enveloping it.

"Yeah," Brody groaned approvingly, his own large cock strained against the thin fabric of his jockstrap. Another camera showed it pulsing every time Blackie took more of the red cock. The camera had zoomed in enough to show a growing, wet, stain on the fabric at the tip of his straining manhood.

Without any preamble, PigBoy moved to his knees and promptly shoved his own large cock into Blackie's mouth, flattening the leather dog mask's snout against his pelvis. Blackie gagged as a result, coughing out saliva around PigBoy's large tool, and fully backing up onto the red dildo, taking the thing in his ass all the way to the base. PigBoy kept thrusting his cock forward, using Blackie's mouth like a flesh light, while Brody kept an obscenely satisfied smile on his face as he continued driving the thick, red, cock into the pulsing anus in front of him. Blackie's wet, slobbering, and gurgling noises boomed out of the speakers. Beside them, Ace whimpered as Aarin had started using a paddle on his raw, red, ass. 

"They like this?" I asked, completely mesmerized by what I was witnessing, my voice still carrying despite competition from the obscene noises in the theatre. The echoing sounds of the moans, groans, gagging, gurgling, sloshing, and paddling rang like a chant in the air. I was not in that room, but I could just imagine the smell of it all. Before I had realized it, the light in the theatre had turned into a soft red colour, enveloping all the bodies in a dim, red, light. "Derek liked that?"

"Do you know why?" Jack asked, so close to my ear that I could feel his breath. 

"Why?" I asked in reply.

"Some people just want to let go." He explained. "Some people like letting go like this. Out there in the world, you can get screwed by things outside of your control. At least here, you have a say on what it is. They can stop it at anytime, and they know it. All the players know it. But they don't want to. Because they like holding onto that control. They like the feeling it gives them." 

I swallowed hard as Brody removed the dildo from Blackie's ass, replaced it on the table, and switched it with a pair of handcuffs. Then, binding Blackie's mitted hands on his back, he cuffed them together. As a result, Blackie only had his knees left to balance himself in that bent position. But astonishingly, he managed to, his thighs were surprisingly steady even through the effort of maintaining the position as well as bracing himself with every thrust of PigBoy's hips. On the TV screen, I could even see Blackie's tongue dart underneath the thick cock, as if it were bathing caressing the tool that fucked into his mouth with his tongue. After placing cuffs, Brody then fished his large cock out from the side of his jockstrap, lathered more lube on Blackie's pulsing anus, before shoving his tool inside of the dog. Blackie moaned obscenely around PigBoys' cock, even managing to arch his back even more, presenting his ass to better meet Brody's hard thrusts. 

"Here, people can let themselves go." Jack continued, resting his hand on my restless leg, stilling it with a firm grip. "Here they don't have to worry about anythin' else but what feels good. There's an addictive kind of liberation when you surrender to someone else's control. Here you don't have to make big decisions about your life. You don't have to worry about doin' the right thing. You only have to do what feels good in the moment. You can feel happy at making someone else feel good. _You_ can feel good."

I watched the scene play out before me intently. Brody had taken Aarin's place, flipped Ace over onto his raw back, raised his legs up in the air, exposing Ace's raw hole and effortlessly drove in his bare cock in one, hard, thrust. Blackie on the other hand had switched over to straddle PigBoy's lap, hovering his ass over the large, raw, dick before sitting down in one effortless movement. Aarin moved to Blackie's side, the head level with his crotch, and shoved the cock, still slick with lube and Ace's ass-juices, into Blackie's mouth. I couldn't help but admire the fitness required to be able to manage squatting up and down on a large cock while sucking on another beside you, still bound and masked. 

Blackie moaned and groaned obscenely at the effort, but he never faltered with his movements. It was mesmerizing in its vulgarity. PigBoy moved Blackie's jockstrap aside, pulling out and exposing a caged cock with a semi-hard dick that was busting to get out, the skin pressed against the hard metal enclosure. Long, viscous, strands of liquid was leaking out of Blackie's thick cock. PigBoy gathered it in his hand before lapping it up with his thick tongue. 

"Does that even feel good?" I asked with a captivated voice, barely registering Jack moving at my side. Looking over I found that he had fished out his sizeable cock, and was slowly stroking it while staring at me. My body stilled at the sight. 

"It does. When was the last time _you_ felt good?" Jack asked, slowly moving to his knees. I watched his movements carefully, my body frozen in confusion and arousal. "Tell me Stiles, when was the last time Derek made ya feel good? Not jackin' yourself off. With someone else. Anyone else." 

"I, don't know." I gulped as Jack slowly moved in a kneeling position in front of me. As the sex in the theatre continued to play out, I was paralyzed by my own pent up desires as Jack slowly opened my legs. His large, hairy hands traveled up my thigh and slowly pulled down the hem of my sweatpants. My clearly hard cock slapped up against my belly. 

"All ya have to do is feel good, Stiles." He whispered while looking into my eyes. "I can make ya feel real good." 

Jack leaned in slowly while wrapping his large, rough hand around my hard cock. He played with the cock head with a thick thumb, spreading the leaking pre-cum at the tip around the base of my cock head. He slowly moved my foreskin down, exposing the entire cock head. He leaned his head over, closer, still slowly massaging my cock with alternating tight grips and firm strokes, and started lapping at my balls with his thick tongue. The feeling of his wet, warm, tongue on my sack was skillful and tender. He lapped and sucked on the tender skin slowly, taking in more of me into himself, until he had fit both of my balls in his mouth. I gasped out in a pleasure with the act that had never been done to me before. 

The distraction in my lap was making it difficult to pay attention to the theatre. I only managed to see glimpses of the theatre scenes on the monitor as my own head arched up in pleasure. I saw a brief glimpse of a cock pissing out a long, steady stream onto someone's ass before the cock was unceremoniously shoved into the wet, pulsing hole. I heard the loud moans on the speakers as the man seemingly pissed inside one of the dog's hole. 

Below me, Jack had moved onto licking my shaft with his warm tongue while playfully putting pressure on my anus with a thick thumb. 

"Do you feel good Stiles?" He asked roughly, looking at me with wet lips and saliva on his beard. 

I nodded dumbly, not having felt something this good in a long time. Even compared to when Derek had surprised me that one morning a few days ago, this was something else entirely. Jack was spending more time making me feel better in a way that I had been deprived of for so long. In the back of my mind, screaming out from behind the thick haze of lust, was a voice who insisted that it should have been Derek. That it shouldn't have been this stranger than not long ago I hated with a passion. The same man that seemingly knew my husband better than I did.

Was this better? 

Did it feel better? Yes. 

But was it better? 

Was it better? 

Am I better?

I asked myself this question repeatedly as I watched Jack leaned over in one effortless bob, taking my whole member into his warm, wet mouth. The pleasurable sensation made me catch a moan in my throat, bursting out like a tortured croak instead. Jack started to hum then, the vibration of which traveled through my cock and into my thigh. I cussed out in pleasure, never having felt such a thing before. Jack slurped up, sucking my cock hard, pulling on the skin with a long, deep, wet, suction while massaging the underside with his warm tongue. 

"Fuck!" I cried out, gripping the arm rests tighter as the pleasurable sensations rushed into my head. In the effort, my eyes snapped back to one of the TV displays. I don't know how, but the angle showed two large asses thrusting into a middle one. I could see two cock tightly pressed together, seemingly shoving into one, tight, pulsing hole. 

Jack even lightly nibble on my foreskin in small, playful bites before sucking the member back into his mouth. As Jack bobbed up and down on my sensitive cock, driving me even closer to an edge I now was more than willing to leap off, I moved my gaze to the front window and into the red theatre. In it I saw Brody on his back, thrusting up into the body atop him. At the same time Aarin was in an awkward squatting position at the top, thrusting in unison with Brody into the body below him. Between them was Blackie's body, sandwiched between the two jocks, apparently taking both cocks into his hole at the same time. Meanwhile Ace was fucking into a standing PigBoy's ass, while PigBoy used the momentum to fuck his cock into Blackie's mouth. His exposed mouth. 

I came in Jack's mouth at the same time Blackie's exposed face registered in my brain, his mask having been removed who knows when. With his half lidded eyes open and rolled up in pleasure, Derek effortlessly took three cocks at the same time into his body. 

"No!" I gasped out with my release as Jack held my thrusting waist down with his strong hands, drinking the ejaculate I emptied into his mouth effortlessly. I tried to push his head away to no avail as he just took me deeper into his mouth, my cock responding positively with the effort, pleasurably pumping more of my seed down Jack's warm, pulsing, throat. 

In the theatre, Derek was moaning through his throat and writhing obscenely between the two men as they thrust their hard cocks into him, his mouth unable to articulate any sound other than a gurgle while being filled by PigBoy's fat dick. 

After I emptied myself, there was nothing. I could feel Jack lightly suckle on my Johnson, slowly removing his mouth from my skin with a loud, obscene, slurp. Before my eyes, Derek continued to be filled by three men, his body moving like a marionette, with the three men's cocks acting like the strings.

There was a cracking, buzzing sound. The viewing window seemed so far away. The red light began changing into hard to see colours in quick flashes. A strobe in my floating consciousness. 

I stood up when Jack had detached himself from my crotch, a satisfied smile on his face. I saw a bit of my cum on his beard. He asked something that I couldn't hear past the crackling and buzzing noise. Derek had closed his eyes in front of me, seemingly surrendering to the sensations of having every hole filled by a thick, hard, cock. None of which was my own. He was feeling good. Like how I had felt good. Like I had done. I didn't want that comparison. 

I tried to walk away but Jack had grabbed my hand, stopping me from moving. I didn't even think about the act. I just watched my body from a curious distance move like how Chris and Allison had taught me so many nights ago. I watched my sharply tucked leg rise into the air. It looked painfully slow in my eyes, but I knew that it must have been faster than it seemed. It didn't look like Jack had noticed. At least not in time. He didn't react as I stretched out my leg as it swung around, arching forward, toward his kneeling body. I wonder if he ever even noticed my leg in time as it snapped out in a straight, hard, line and smashed against the back of his skull, slamming his form into the folded seat in front of him. There was a loud, horribly obscene crunching sound that would make anyone else flinch. Probably. I'm not sure. There was only the buzzing. 

There was only the crackling. 

In there with the sounds, there was something else. Pain? Grief? Anger? 

A break. A relief. A surrender? 

Mindlessly I found myself somewhere else. Maybe it was underwater, my vision blurred from something wet. Maybe rain. There was someone else before that. I think I may have punched someone's throat. I think I felt something crack in my own swollen fist. But my skin was numb. I was probably wrong. 

I was somewhere else. It was so difficult to see. So difficult to hear past the buzzing. 

Faintly, I heard a song. _If this world is wearing thin, and you're thinking of escape..._

There was a familiar face in front of me. He looked at me with pitying eyes as if he knew how I felt. Did he know? I didn't. What did I feel?

_I'll go anywhere with you_. _Just wrap me up in chains_. 

I did feel things. I felt Jack's head on my foot as it smashed into it. I think I may have felt someone's throat on my knuckles. 

_But if you try to go alone_. _Don't think I'll understand_. 

There were other things. Angry things. Now in my palm there was something else. 

A small white pill. Did that familiar face give it to me? A familiar face with a familiar pill. 

_Stay with me_.

What?

_Stay with me_.

Why?

_In the silence of your room_.

I don't have one anymore.

_In the darkness of your dreams_.

I don't remember them. Not anymore. 

_You must only think of me_.

I don't want to. Can't I think of something else?

_There can be no in between_. 

But I have nothing else. 

_When your pride is on the floor_. 

I lost that. A long time ago, I think.

_I'll make you beg for more_.

Please. 

_Stay with me_.

Please.

_Stay with me_. 

Why? 

I looked at the pill in my hand. The music was breaking through my daze. But it meant nothing. There was nothing. There was no meaning. Why bother remembering? This helped make me forget once, I think, why not again? Even if for a little while. Maybe I could even forget the satisfying feel of that obscene crunching sound. 

But before I could place it in on my tongue, I was blinded by a bright light that flashed in my eyes. A deep, heavy tempo banged through the buzzing and crackling, filling my head with deep, steady, beats. 

_You'd better hope and pray, that you make it safe back to your own world_. 

She sang on a dais above the stage, a vision of silver and black. She walked out of that light, high up in the sky, descending down a short flight of steps in slow deliberate movements. She hadn't been looking at me. But I was looking at her, having taken my attention with her siren song. 

_You'd better hope and pray_ , _that you'll wake one day in your own world_.

Is that... you? Why are you here?

_'Cause when you sleep at night, they don't hear your cries in your own world_.

Did you? Why... are you dressed like that? 

_Only time will tell if you can break the spell back in your own world_. 

Why are you here?

The curiosity broke through my daze. The surprise of it was enough to give me a rather curious purpose other than the intense desire to give in and forget, even if only for a moment. The silver vision descended with a maniacal smile, her gaze sweeping over the crowd whose presence finally broke through my consciousness. With a maddened smile and insane eyes she swept over my figure. I saw the flash of recognition there, her head tilting briefly in curiosity, reflecting my own. This curiosity and surprise was like a lifeline in the darkness. My curiosity piqued. It was a trigger as much now as it had been before, pulling me out of the quicksand of my life. It was somehow comforting at this broken moment. Even when I had felt there was nothing left, stripped down to the base, it seemed that I at least had my curiosity to help drive me forward. As it always had. It lead me into the woods to find a dead body that changed my life after all.

The other singer screamed dreadfully, the light briefly flashing blue in her grief.

_Stay with me_! She cried in song, clutching onto an unconscious man on her lap while the silver vision hovered closer to take him away, the maddened smile still on her lips. 

Why?

I moved to the edges of the crowd, looking for that door that would lead me backstage. It was there in the side, unmanned and open as if welcoming me to pass through it.

_Stay with me_! The other singer cried again in her whistling notes. On the stage, the silver vision fought her for control of the sleeping man. 

Why?!

_Stay, stay with me_! 

I...

On the stage, the silver vision laughed at the singer's words. She reveled in her desperate cries. 

_Stay, stay, stay, stay, stay_.... the singer cried as I hastily marched through the doors. 

Why would I?

No one stopped my restricted advance. I walked quickly through a narrow hallway and up a messy flight of cement steps. I burst through another door and turned down several more corridors, mindlessly following the distant cries. 

_Stay with me_! I barely heard the singer cry in the distance. 

No.

Then with a flash of a dull, luminescent light, I burst into an empty space. There were ropes hanging from the ceiling, touching down all the way to the floor. There were packages and boxes and things that I couldn't recognize. Near me there was a small flight of steps that led up into a stage draped by a long curtain. Descending the stairs while the singer's faint cries echoed in the background was the vision in silver. 

She stepped down the steps slowly, her face smiling lazily as if it was unsurprising that I had come to greet her. 

She stopped not far before me, tilting her head to the side and tapping her chin curiously. Still smiling that familiar and frustratingly amused smile. 

"Well." She whispered in that deep, memorable, voice, so unlike her current figure. But the deviousness was the same, nonetheless. It was mark that was difficult to hide, ever the telltale stain on their character. "Well, well. Hello."

It took me a moment to respond, the curious sight before me had throttled my common sense. Once again I was totally unsure of what I wanted to do. I realized then that is was an oddly nostalgic experience; stumbling from one frustrating coincidence into another. Every desire lead to making plans that only end up falling apart and confusing everyone involved. But the drive to move forward was familiar. It was similar. 

"I don't know what I want to do." I confessed. "I should kick your ass. Maybe kill you. Again. But I kinda don't want to do it in that dress."

"Mhm." Was all she said, smiling wider now, mindlessly tapping her chin with a gloved finger. 

"What the hell are you doing here?" I asked. "And why the hell are you dressed like that, Peter?"

Peter smiled that wide toothy smile as, in the distance, someone sang, asking me to stay. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right. So. The sex scene ended up getting really long. I ended up adding a few in there actually. So I bumped Peter's appearance to the end and onto the next chapter. This was pretty fun to write in a fucked up way (jeez - what does that say about me?). I annoyed my partner at one point, cause it was 1 in the morning and I was still writing some of the sex scenes. (ง ͠° ͟ل͜ ͡°)ง
> 
> ALSO: I know some people are gonna be pissed about this, but yes, it was Peter in drag. No, I don't think it's out of character. Peter isn't human (for the most part). Dude has literally had multiple forms, one of which was a giant literal monster. Peter's human form is freaking drag. To quote RuPaul - "we're born naked, everything else is drag". I feel like all Werewolves are just playing dress up and pretend at certain points. Even Scott. Fighting between what their wolf wants and what they're supposed to act like as "humans". So Peter in drag? Not such a big leap for me. Sorry if you disagree. But man, it was fun to write. I mean, he's already sassy and fabulous even without the drag... 
> 
> Also, I'm thinking of adding an interlude in the next chapter to answer some of you questions. The discussion in this fic has been the most diverse and dynamic that I've ever seen in one of my writings. It's way too intimidating to keep up with all the comments and questions. So I was just thinking of grabbing a few and answering them in an interlude. Probably will. Unless there's a huge backlash against it. But I'll likely pick the questions I can answer as long as it won't ruin future chapters.


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter lays bare the truth of things as Stiles finds that there's no rest for the weary.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I binged watched all "What Would You Do" videos on YouTube. No, I do not regret it. Are they fake? My tears weren't. T_T
> 
> Notes at the end. Please read it.
> 
> I edited a bunch of their conversation in this. I think I accidentally edited something out... but I can't find it nor remember where it supposed to be. Or what it is. Ugh, I swear I'll remember in 15 minutes and regret posting this without it. >.< Danggit.

The silence between us was almost as deafening as the ringing had been. In my discomfort, I flexed my hands and tapped my foot. 

"You." I said, surprised and confused. 

"Me." He smirked. 

More awkward silence followed between us as the song on the stage began to fade. Several strands of stray light pierced through the cloth veil, briefly illuminating the dimly lit space. The light hit upon Peter's silhouette, briefly extending the length of his shadow like a backlit spotlight on a stage. 

"You." I repeated.

"Me." He smiled widely. He tilted his head curiously and asked, "have you talked to Lydia lately?"

"Shit!" I exclaimed, the question startled me out of my daze, causing me to lose my grip on what I had been holding in my hand. The pill slipped from my fingers and fell falling to the ground, I felt around for it before losing track of it somewhere in the dark. By the time I had looked up, I caught Peter staring at me with a very curious eyebrow. I quickly got to my feet and snapped my spine straight, tapped my thighs with my hands, overwhelmed by a sudden bout of anxiety. 

"Have you been taking your Aderrall lately?" He asked curiously. 

"I don't need it anymore. I haven't taken it in three years." I spat out angrier than it possibly warranted, plunging us into another awkward silence. 

"Ugh, I was so fabulous I could cry." Anastasia suddenly exclaimed out of nowhere, bursting through the curtains with a bright flash of light and a triumphant smile on her face. She lightly shoved Peter's still form as she made her way down. "You! Don't just stand there. Our next spot is in two hours and you haven't even started changing faces." 

She marched down the small flight of steps far more elegantly than her high heeled stilettos should have allowed, and greeted me with a surprised smile after noticing me for the first time.

"Oh. You're here. Came to congratulate me backstage? That's so sweet. But this is for talent only, honey. And why haven't you changed yet? Your clothes should have been done by now." She said as she leaned over and give me two, quick, cheek kisses. When she had pulled back, the smile on her face vanished and was replaced by one of concern. She grabbed hold of my chin with two fingers, tilting my face upwards, and studied me critically with narrowed eyes. "Something happened. Did you go see your husband?"

"What? No." I balked at her question, my eyes quickly darted to glance at Peter's still form. 

But Anastasia had caught the glance, and she turned to face Peter with her hands on her hips. 

"What the hell did you do?" She asked crossly. "What did you do Haley?" 

"Wait. Haley?" I asked, bemused by the name, my neck inching forward with a barely contained toothy grin that flared on my face. "What?"

"Haley Grave, at your service." Peter replied with a flourish, extending both gloved hands in the air. He quickly turned to Anastasia with his extended hands turned palms up in surrender. "I didn't do anything." 

Anastasia looked between Peter and myself, studied our expressions for a moment then leaned back with a highly arched eyebrow, her hands on her hips. 

"Uh, uh." She said, shaking her head at Peter. "No. You do not get to play with this little boy toy. Not today, devil. You keep that wrinkled rigor mortis right inside your coffin."

"Excuse me?" Peter asked with wide eyes, touching his chest in mock outrage. Despite his attire, I found it difficult to picture Peter as anything other than a man. His muscles were clearly threatening to burst out of his tight, silver, cat suit. "I would never."

"Oh yes you would." Anastasia glowered before turning to me with a fierce expression. "And you. Don't play with fire after you've been burned. Kid, you've just left one bad decision, you don't need to walk into another one."

"I'm a bad decision now?" Peter asked to no one in particular, a very bemused smile plastered on his face. 

"It's fine." I replied, trying to calm a seemingly flustered Anastasia who seemed to be trying to stare Peter down. Standing at a respectable 6'2" in heels against Peter's roughly 5'11 height in his boots, it wasn't a difficult job. "I know him from back home. He's my... he's my - husband's, uncle." 

"That's not any better." She argued, eyeing Peter even more suspiciously. 

"No, seriously. It's fine." I insisted. "And, thanks."

Anastasia stilled at the words, her face impassive for a second before tapping me tenderly on the cheek. She then quickly snapped her head around to level a glare at Peter. 

"We have two hours before our next show. Don't be late and don't fuck up our routine." She said, poking Peter's chest with a well manicured nail. 

"Like I ever." He responded with an exaggerated eye roll as Anastasia started to walk away. 

She stopped beside me for a second, her mouth opening as if she had something else to say before shaking her head and just leaving silently with a soft pat on my shoulder. 

"I still haven't decided if I should kill you or not." I muttered seriously after Anastasia had left, leaving Peter and I alone backstage. "I want to. But it'd be weird doing it right now. When you look like a different person." 

"Well, you haven't let that stop you before." He replied, brushing a strand of hair away from his face. "But I'm sure you'd be more comfortable talking in private. My dressing room's just over there." 

"Dressing room? That sounds fancy." He said before adding in much lower voice, "that sounds just like you." 

"It should. After all, I own the fucking club." He replied nonchalantly, walking away without looking back to see if I would follow. He stopped only a few metres away next to a blue door with a large, yellow, star embossed with the name 'Haley Grave'. 

He walked in without closing the door, and I quickly follow him inside just as a group of performers dressed like various savannah animals burst from around the corner, running towards the stage steps. Their excitement was palpable, barely suppressing their glee with high pitched squeals. I closed the door behind me tightly and turned the lock. 

"You own the club? Since when have you owned a club?" I asked disbelievingly. 

"Jealous?" He asked teasingly before turning around and exposed his back, looking to me over his shoulders. "Mind helping me unzip?" 

"No thanks." I respond dryly. 

Peter raised an eyebrow before turning to face his mirrors. He tilted his head and levelled me with that patented, mischievous, Peter Hale stare through the dressing room mirror. "I thought you wanted to kill me? This is a rather tame response."

He chuckled to himself, tipping his head down as he slowly started removing pins and clips from the wig on his head. The moment his statement registered in my consciousness, Derek's words flooded back into my mind followed by the awareness of a missing block of time. 

"I... I don't actually remember how I got here." I confessed, suddenly confused by my presence in Anastasia's club. Or, rather. Peter's. "You _own_ a club? You're a drag queen? How long have you been in San Francisco?"

Peter placed the wig on a head form on his desk before removing multiple rings from his fingers and placing them on the table top. Turning around, he leaned against the edge and watched me curiously. 

"That's a lot of questions. Here's another one. Why do you smell of different people's blood? And sex?" His lips curled into a knowing smirk. "Does Derek know you've been a naughty boy? I have to say I'm proud of you Stiles. For a moment there I wondered if you'd grown dull from the shackles of domestic bliss." 

"I don't remember." I muttered, trying to make sense of the muddled images in my mind. "I think, I really hurt somebody."

"Well. If it makes you feel better, there's far too little blood for it to have been lethal. Probably. Well, usually. Otherwise, you'd have much more than the few specs of it on your shoes and on your very, dirty, bandaged hand." He explained before frowning distastefully at my hands. "Yeah, that's just disgusting. When was the last time you changed your bandages?" 

"I heard a crack." I muttered under my breath, ignoring Peter's questions as I slowly recalled the very pleasant sensation of my foot colliding with something solid followed by a very pleasant, cracking sound. 

I stared at my hands, trying to pull the memories from the fog. Although I remembered every moment that had happened at that... sex dungeon, it was difficult to remember everything that came after. Everything had been a blur of the colour red and pain. Then there had been a song. Then the pill. Then the desperation to forget. Had I taken it after all? I looked up to find Peter staring at me impatiently, the top half his well muscled body leaning forward expectantly. 

He clapped his hands after I remained silent for far too long and unable to understand his unspoken question. 

"Well. This was fun." He said. "Excuse me but I have a show in about an hour. So, you can go now."

He reached around his back and unzipped himself out of his costume, revealing a heavily muscled, smooth, chest with a lace bra padded with socks. 

"Are those socks? You slept with my dad." I said both sentences blankly, letting the exclamation of the latter hang in another bout of silence. 

Peter's face stills at my words, holding his unhooked bra and a several bundles of rolled up socks in his hands. I remember thinking that those socks were rather tacky for someone who could afford better. 

"It's weird that you have several apartments and expensive cars, but your fake boobs are made of socks." I pointed out. "You fucked my dad." 

Peter watched me awkwardly, his mouth gaping like a fish, seemingly transitioning from one unfinished sentence to another. 

"Right. Which I suppose explains that wanting to kill me thing." He responded with a tiny bit of amusement in his voice. "Who told you- right, no. Derek."

"Yeah. Derek." I said the name coldly. 

"Why does that matter? Here? Now?" He questioned, looking confused and flustered by the statement. 

"Why does it matter that you slept with my dad?" I asked the question back, sounding out the question again out loud. "I. Wh-. Why wouldn't it matter? He's not gay." 

"Not with his sense of style, he isn't." Peter suddenly laughed loudly, his mocking laughter rang throughout the small space. He quickly smothered his amusement after my rather cold reaction. "I don't really care what thinks he is. But, right. Yes. I have slept with him. That was decades ago. When we were teenagers. Why does that matter now?"

"You're lying. You always lie." I snarled. I balled both of my hands into fists and ignoring the shooting pain on my right hand. I angrily faced the increasingly confused man before me, my next words bleeding out tremendous disdain. "You're a lying, selfish, bastard." 

He tilted his head slightly from side to side in affirmation, even scrunched up his face in the way that he did when he agreed with something. "All true. Yes. But not with this one. I still don't understand how my sexual escapades with your father during our formative years is any of your business." 

"Did you sneak around behind my mom's back too?" I asked angrily, slowly stepping forward. At that point, my anger no longer felt like my own. I was suddenly faced with another one of the questions I had been avoiding in my mind. How long had my father been with Derek? With men? It seemed like he had no qualms with fucking his son's mate, had he done the same with his wife too? While she lay in that damn hospital, dying? 

Peter levelled his face once again to an indiscernible expression, watching my every movement with curious, attentive eyes. "No. Teenagers, Stiles. I've never met your mother." 

"Liar!" I spat out angrily, having stalked closer while my anger began to reach a fever pitch. "Did you two screw around while they were married? Did you fuck around while she was dying?"

"No. I was in a coma by the time that happened." He pointed out in vain. 

"Liar!" I screamed, throwing myself against him. I swung my arms forward, striking him heavily in the jaw with my injured hand. His body didn't even move, and I only managed to force his head to snap to the side with my punch. In comparison, my hand stung after the hit. 

Without allowing for any sort of pause, I had swung my again. I placed more weight into that next punch. He caught my arm effortlessly with one hand and grasped my neck with another. Suddenly I found myself flung against the wall, suspended in midair by Peter's tight grip around my throat. 

"Calm down." He snarled angrily, his eyes even flashed that bright beta blue. 

I brought my left elbow down on the arm gripping my neck, causing Peter's hold to slacken for a moment. I dropped to the ground as a result, and by the time my feet touched the ground, I had aimed another quick punch towards his neck. My aim successfully connected with Peter's throat, and the older man staggered back, choking from my blow. In quick succession, I punched up with my left fist, up his jaw, and caused to stagger back onto the table. The wood rattled loudly against the wall, and a few things crashed loudly on the floor. 

I lunged again with another fist, but he effortlessly stopped the blow with one hand, his face scrunched into an angry snarl. As I'm suddenly lifted into the air once again, Peter just as quickly slammed my body onto the ground. I lost my breath in a loud gasp as I crashed onto the floor on my back. I didn't even have a moment to rally by the time Peter had jumped atop my prone form, and used his weight to keep me still. I tried to struggle out of his grip by pivoting my waist to the side. But Peter pressed down on my shoulders with his clawed hands, gluing my body to the ground. He sat against my waist and placed both of his feet securely beside my body. 

"Calm down!" He snarled in an eerily low, hard voice in my ear. "Or I'll rip out your throat." 

I still tried to struggle out from underneath his heavy weight. Despite being slightly taller (although he would have argued that fact), I always did forget that Peter actually weighed more due to his heavily muscled body. I spat at his face in my frustration, and startled the angry Were still for a second. He snarled deep and low in response and bared his sharp, numerous fangs in my face. A panicked pounding on his dressing room door thankfully pulled the angry Were's attention just as his nails began drilling into the skin of my shoulder. 

"What's going on in there?" A loud frantic voice called out from the other side, pounding again after a failed attempt at trying to open the door. I don't even remember if I had locked it. 

Peter narrowed his eyes at my squirming form. He leaned forward and placed his sharp fangs so close against my ear that I could feel the slightest moist touch of his wet tongue. His voice was a low and unsettling rumble. "Don't. You. Make. A sound."

Peter forced his eyes close and let out a deep breath just as the voice called out once again, while pounding loudly at the door. 

"Everything's fine. Nothing to worry about." Peter managed to reply brightly, his voice unperturbed and friendly. As an odd contrast, his clawed hands tightened around my shoulders, pushing me even harder against the ground. My spine croaked with the effort, and I held back a grunt that had threatened to escape my lips. He leaned over quickly and whispered in a frustrated, human voice, "say something. Help keep the nosy busybody alive and away." 

I stared at him for a second, the pain on my shoulders trumped the pain in my hand. I cried out in as calm a voice as I could hope to manage in that situation. "Everything's fine. I just tried to walk in heels." 

"Oh." I heard the voice at the other side of the door exclaim in surprise and disappointment, followed by their clacking footsteps walking away.

Peter narrowed his eyes before he spoke next, tightening his grip on my shoulders even harder. "Now, are you going to calm down and explain what the fuck you think you're doing? You may be my favourite, Stiles, but there are limits to the shit I'm willing to put up with. Even from you."

"I'm fine." I muttered with more anger than what I actually felt. At that point, the discomfort of his weight on my body and his nails digging into my skin had quashed the indignant rage. In response to his dubiously narrowed eyes, I replied with even more forced calm. "I'm. Calm."

He studied my eyes once again for a few seconds, seemingly looking for something in them before nodding to himself. He stood up effortlessly, dragging my body up with him. He pointed to the small couch at the side of the room, his face scrunched up in irritation.

"Sit. Explain." He commanded. 

Nursing my wounded shoulders, I shuffled towards the couch before collapsing into it in exhaustion. I leaned forward, placed my elbows on my knees, and rubbed my head in frustration. I wiped my face with my good hand, before looking up at his defensive form, arms crossed against his bare, muscular, chest, glowering down at me. 

"Derek told me you slept with my dad." I confessed quietly, while fiddling with the dirty bandage of my right hand. 

"Apropos of nothing?" He asked dubiously. 

"I..." I began before catching the words at the back of my throat. I forced the words forward with an awkward cough and shifted my weight in my seat. "It was after I found a video."

"Yes?" He pressed, twisting his hand in the air for me to continue. 

"Of him and my dad together, in bed." The words brought back the image of it in my mind in a blinding flash. Their writhing forms and their smiling faces suddenly filled every corner in my mind. I pounded my temples with my fists and shut my eyes tightly, trying to drive the painful memory away. "The night before our wedding." 

"Oh." He said with what sounded like surprise. Looking up, I watched the astonished expression on his face freeze into an open mouthed gape. "Wow." 

I fidgeted in my seat, restlessly tapping my foot on the floor as I watched a series of curious expressions cross his face. All of those expressions seemed sincere, but where they? Experience had taught me that Hale men couldn't be trusted. By the time he had settled on disbelief, he had pulled a seat for himself and had settled in an uncomfortable pose in front of me, leg crossed and his body twisted awkwardly.

"And he said that I did it too?" He asked. 

"Yes." I replied evenly. 

He nodded at my reply, his arms crossed tightly around his body. "Right. Yes. I'm going to say this one more time. You dad and I _have_ been intimate. When we were teenagers. Haven't really done anything since." 

The images of Derek and my father naked and laughing in bed pulled another snarl from my chest. I clasped my hands tightly in between my legs and thankfully resisted the sudden urge of violence that suddenly tried to overwhelm me. 

"Right. Why don't you start from the beginning. The short version. I have a show later, but this is _way_ to weird to miss out on." He said before he shifted his weight on his rickety looking seat. The position he settled on suspiciously highlighted the numerous muscles on his body, especially his well defined chest and biceps. Suddenly the reality of him doing drag actually explained why he was smooth shaven all the time. My other theory had been plain old vanity. 

To my surprise, I did as I was told, repeating the story of the past few days for the first time in its entirety. Condensed with certain omissions, sure, but I had shared the truth regardless. And, I as much as I hated to admit it, it had felt good to do so. Summarizing the entirety of my pain in five minutes somehow minimized it. The past few days suddenly seemed much shorter than they had felt. The constant anger, grief, and frustration suddenly seemed lodged in a much smaller span of time. Somehow it felt wrong or incomplete, having explained something I felt was so big so quickly with far less words than I thought I would use. Suddenly, for that moment, my misery seemed far smaller than I had thought it to be. The pain in my hand seemed worse than the ache in my heart. 

"Right. So. You were sexually frustrated, looked up porn, but found out your husband cheated on you. You fought, tried to kill him a few times, but not really, and then left. Then you went on a drugged and sex fuelled bender, went to a sex club, found Derek cheating on you again, and might have killed one of his lovers as a result?" Peter summarized with an oddly manic look in his eyes. "Wow." 

I flinched when he suddenly clapped his hands. He then leaned back in his seat and scratched his bare chest before stretching out his arms, cracking the joints.

"So, what now? I suggest killing him. I have a few things at the penthouse that should do the trick." He suddenly rambled enthusiastically, smiling wickedly. "Something slow, maybe? Poison? Or how about fire? Go with family tradition." 

"Don't you think it's a bit odd that you're trying to convince me to kill your nephew?" I asked wryly, still surprised at how calm I suddenly felt. It was a different calm. Different form the meandering stillness form before. It didn't feel like the still waters in between waves that I rode during alternating segments of grief. 

"Don't you think it's a bit odd that _you're_ not dying to?" He asked in turn, an eyebrow raised questioningly. "So to speak. It's not like you've never done it before. You did it to me after all."

"I'm not that person." I replied, shaking my head. 

"Oh, yeah, you are." He scoffed incredulously. You threw a Molotov cocktail at me. You tried to kill the pack, _several_ times."

"That wasn't me. You know that. That was different. I'm not killing Derek." I spat out at having to be reminded of bitter memories. 

"Why not? He already killed your marriage." He laughed. "Just kill him a little. It'll help you feel good. You could always bring him back afterwards, if you want to."

"What the hell is wrong with you?"

He widened his eyes and scoffed loudly at my question. "What's wrong with me? What the hell is wrong with you? You've been moping around, for like what, three days? While your mate continues to lie and hurt you. Instead you're taking it out on people other than the one who deserves it the most." 

"I fucking stabbed him, Peter. I smashed a baseball bat on his head that would have killed anyone else." I argued against his words. 

Peter scoffed again and laughed at my response. "Please. You _know_ how to kill Werewolves. You've been doing it since you were sixteen. You didn't even try." 

"God, why am I even listening to you? I was just thinking that I hadn't felt this calm for days, and now I'm pissed off all over again. You know what? Why am I still here?" I asked no one in particular, exclaiming my irritation to the wind. "If I wanted an opinion on how best to fuck people over, I'd ask you. Hell, I'd ask any Hale man. You bastards seem pretty good at that. Who the hell are you to judge anyone's relationship? When was the last time you even had one? Did your libido burn out in that fire too?" 

"Are you done?" He asked calmly after my angry rant. "Despite what you might think, I'm not an idiot. I have a psychology degree. I'm also a licensed therapist." 

"Fuck off." I replied with disbelief, my mouth contorted into a mocking smile. 

Peter just nodded in response. 

"Well, that's ironic." I pointed out. "Considering you ended up in a mental hospital."

"Once again because of you meddling kids." He replied jokingly, snapping his fingers in the air. 

"Alright, say something therapeutic." I challenged. 

"Resentment is the poison you feed yourself while expecting the other to suffer. Revenge is the perfect antidote to betrayal." He said as he leaned close.

"Still doesn't sound like something a therapist would say." I argued. "Don't think they would push for mariticide." 

"What kind of man are you that you won't even try? Don't disappoint me now, Stiles." He drawled. 

"You're a maniac." I insisted. "I'm not a murderer." 

"Well, you did say you might've cracked some skulls recently." He replied. "And what're you talking about? You've killed plenty of times."

"Monsters, Peter. Not people!" I snapped back before getting on my feet to frantically pace the room. 

"Well, he _is_ a Werewolf..." Peter pointed out smartly. 

"Don't you have even more inspiring quotes to plagiarize." I mocked.

"How about 'everyone fails at who they're supposed to be. The measure of a man is how they succeed at being who they are'." He said sagely. "And going with history, you are a mother-fucking killer, kid. So, go succeed!" 

"Did you just quote the Avengers at me?" I glowered. "I mean, thank you for the Thor comparison. But a bit insulting that it's during his fat suit phase." 

"Oh, please. We both know you'd still sleep with him even with the fat suit." Peter said rolling his eyes. "And you're not changing the subject." 

"Shut it Rene Russo." I spat out. "I'm not you. I'm _nothing_ like you. I don't casually suggest murdering the people in my life. What the hell is wrong with you Hales? Why can't you just leave if you're so miserable? Why do you have to try and drag people down with you?"

"Are you still talking about me, or my promiscuous nephew?" He asked calmly. 

I stopped pacing and faced a still calmly sitting Peter. "Why do _you_ stick around? Or did. Why did you stay with the pack for so long? I mean, I helped kill you. You got burned. Literally. Three times. Why do you stay in Beacon Hills? You apparently have a business here. You have an apartment. You have the money. What's holding you there? Why do you stay? Why continue making the people in your life miserable?"

"All true. But that's pack life." He shrugged before getting on his feet. 

"What?" I ask with disbelief. "That's not an answer."

"Isn't it?" He tilted his head curiously at me before walking away, heading towards a set of Venetian closet doors. "I may have tried to kill Derek and all of you, but I failed. Meanwhile you all tried to kill me and succeeded. There you go. We move on. Maybe we'll try to kill each other tomorrow, maybe not. Who knows? So why don't you give killing him a shot? Let some of that anger out on the one who deserved it the most."

"That's fucked up. That's not pack. That's not family." I argued. "That's just... I don't know what it is." 

"Well, I suppose it would be the most difficult for you to understand." He replied casually before rooting around in a small bag on the table. 

"Why? Because I'm human?" I asked as anger once again seeped into my tone. I supposed I had lit that fuse far too many times of late. I likely had lost it days ago, when it all started. 

"No. Difficult, but not impossible. It may not be simple, but you're also not that stupid." He replied casually as he rooted through the closet. "You knew who Derek was when you met him, while he was in that specific part of his life. You understood him. He knew you and understood you, back then anyway. You fought beside him. You bled with him. You beat a bunch of other monsters together. But there are no monsters here, Stiles. There's no chaos that makes either of you important." 

"What the hell does that mean?" I demanded bitterly. 

"It means everything has a shelf life. Even passion. Especially something that you don't use. It'll atrophy and decay. That's what you did with your marriage. That's what he did with his relationship with you. Both of you grew complacent." He pointed out before pulling a set of dark clothes and a bag from the closet.

"Well forgive me for expect my husband to---" I started to say before being interrupted by an indignant Peter. 

"To what? Be monogamous? Monogamy has nothing to do with love or infidelity. Different conversations." He insisted loudly. "Hell, you could be polyamorous and still not be a cheating bastard. Affairs are less about sex and more about desires. It could be anything that you weren't giving to him. It could be time, attention, or anything else. Even a fucking pop tart."

"He should have talked to me. We could have done something together." I insisted.

"You're ignoring one crucial thing, Stiles. It seems your marriage was already dying on the vine before it even began." He argued. "You said yourself, he fucked your father the night before you forged your mating bond. It didn't just happen here, it already happened back in Beacon Hills. How are you going to explain that? What else could you have done to stop it? Does knowing the answer even matter?"

"That was supposed to mean something. I was his mate and he was mine!" I exclaimed. It was the first time I voiced something that had held on too. One of the biggest things that confused the act of betrayal. I was his mate. He was mine. It was supposed to be about unconditional love and devotion. Not the pain. 

"Do you even know what that means?" He demanded. 

"What? I, it means were mated. He's mine and I'm his." I stammered. 

"You know jack shit, kid. You jumped into something you didn't even know or understand." He sneered. "And there you are bitching about how it's not fair and how it's not supposed to be that way? You don't even know what it's supposed to be."

"Then you tell me. _You_ explain it. You tell me why." I snapped back as moved to sit in front of the table, pulling a small bag out from the side of the table. "Because apparently I can't understand it. So I'm sorry if I can't understand all of this at once. That it's taking me some time to wrap my head around what apparently was a failing marriage from the start. That I was too stupid to understand what loyalty meant. I'm sorry that it's hard for me to pick up the pieces of my life without bleeding out. I'm sorry that I'm not strong enough for you or being the man everyone apparently expected me to be... for being such a fucking disappointment. I'm sorry for being in pain." 

"Oh for fuck's sake." He muttered as he cleaned his face with a moist toilette, clearing the heavy make up on his skin. "It's not just about you. Even happy people cheat, Stiles. And it's no one's fault that you fell in love. Not even Derek's. You said yes when he asked. You said yes during the ceremony. You left with him. He asked you. He said yes. He left with you."

"Because I thought he loved me." I pointed out evenly, angry and confused at the direction this conversation was going. 

"You fell in love with the Derek you built up in your head. That was the Derek you fought and bled with. That was the Derek you said yes to. It was your imagination that was responsible for your love, not Derek." He explained quickly, the frustration was clear in his voice . "The same with him. He built you up in his head and apparently couldn't take the reality of things. And there were no big bad monsters here to take it out on. For the first time in a long while, he had to face real, normal problems, and he failed. But you did too."

"You're just making excuses for him. Trying to take things apart." I argued.

"No, that's you." He pressed as he scrubbed more makeup off from his neck. "You're making excuses for why you've done nothing but mope around and living in your own misery. You could end it all right at the start. But you didn't. You're picking and choosing now at what you want to be angry at. What to fight for. What to ignore. The same thing you've been doing through your whole marriage, it sounds like. If you've invested even a tiny fraction of the boldness and the verve on your marriage as I know your capable of, then maybe he wouldn't have strayed. And maybe you wouldn't have been such an ignorant fool."

"Fuck you." I spat out.

"The same with him. He had access to everyone. San Francisco has a lot of options for love and intimacy. Hell, with all those options out in the Web-"

"The 'Web'? It's not the 90's, grandpa." I interrupted. 

"As I was saying," he bristled. " It's been statistically proven, that the more options someone is faced with, the less satisfied they are with their final choice." 

He continued despite my angry denial while he pulled off the painted acrylic nails on his fingers. I glowered at his seemingly cavalier attitude that shifted on a dime from homicidal proposals to sage wisdom. 

"At least he has the excuse of being a Werewolf." He added. 

"There it is. Using being a Werewolf as an excuse. I fucking knew it." I laughed bitterly at his words. "Even Scott never did that."

"Yes, he did. It's not just an excuse, it's a reality. You could never understand the degree in which Weres have to compartmentalize their identities everyday. Scott understands it. You could have too, if you took the bite. I mean, I've technically been several kinds of monsters. I've been different identities that act as one. Multiple organisms with different motivations and desires acting as one sentient being. At the very least I thought you could empathise. I thought you had." He explained while staring at me through the mirror. His eyes looked disappointed. "Especially after everything you've been through. Guess I was wrong." 

"You mean compartmentalizing morality because you're a Werewolf?" I said bitterly, remembering the words I had spat out at Derek a few night ago. "That's sounds like a lazy excuse to justify being an asshole. 'Oh, it wasn't me who screwed you over! It was my wolf who wanted to stick my dick in this jackass'. 'Yeah, Stiles. I wish I could have told you how miserable I was in our marriage, but the wolf, ya know? Gotta get railed by scummy looking jackasses instead'!"

"We have a choice. Scott had a choice. I had a choice. Derek had a choice. It's not just about instinct, Stiles. It's the choosing to act on it." He explained tiredly. He studied me through the mirror the entire time, his reflection was like an impassive effigy. It was an odd shift from the enthusiastic Peter from a few minutes ago, who had encouraged the death of his nephew. "It wasn't just instinct that made my sister take my memories about my daughter. It wasn't instinct that made Deucalion, Kali, and Ennis take the lives of their pack. We're human too, subject to everything that makes humans so fucking, weak. We're capable of bad fucking decisions, same as everyone else. Jealousy. Anger. Ambition. Desire. We feel those just as intensely as humans do. More so at times. Depends on the moon. Sometimes, there isn't a good reason why someone hurts you. Just a reason." 

"What the fuck does that mean?" I asked again, confused and angry. 

"It means, he chose to fuck other people, Stiles." He clarified with a sigh and a rather condescending eye roll. "You chose to ignore it. Again, you're not that stupid or lazy. But he also made the decision to 'get railed', as you said. He knew what he was doing, even if he lied to himself about it, like how I think you lied to yourself about not noticing it was all going to shit. Still, he made those choices knowing full well what would happen. You made your choices knowing what you'd be neglecting. You're going to learn one day that not everyone deserves to be forgiven. Or wants it, despite what they say. You just see what they do. It takes wisdom to admit to being hurt, but it takes courage to do something about it. Stop being a fucking coward, Stiles. Face your betrayer. Move forward. Fucking do something about it."

He stood up and casually removed the silver pants he wore, exposing form fitting boxer briefs that showed a very curious bulge. The sight of it temporarily distracted my efforts to make sense of his confusing rationalization. Was he rationalizing? There were parts of his argument that I couldn't help but understand, maybe even agree with. But I refused to. 

"I don't want to lose-" I mumbled sadly.

"What? Derek? It sounds like you already did." He replied with roll of his eyes. "Friends? The pack?"

"Are you..." I asked, unable to pull my eyes away from the bulge sticking out in the wrong direction. His last statement completely missed my attention. 

"Tucking?" Peter finished the question for me as he turned around, the amusement was clear on his face. "Yes. There we go." 

He shoved his large hands down his briefs and moved his equipment around, forming a sizable bulge that jutted out the logical way around. 

"And the answer is no, if you were wondering." He answered an unasked question with a devious smirk.

"What?" I asked warily.

"No, I don't tuck my balls back in the inguinal canal." He replied with a wide smile and a wink. "They're too big. My cock is too."

"No one asked." I muttered under my breath as Peter laughed. 

I watched as Peter began putting on the dark clothes he had pulled from the closet, while shoving even more things that I could not see clearly from the closet into the bag. It then dawned on me that this did not seem like someone who was preparing for his next show. In fact, it looked like Peter was planning to leave. 

But before I could ask, he spoke of something so contextually horrific so casually. "I mean, I tried to kill Derek and Scott because I really do think I'd make a better Alpha. I failed. They got over it. You'll get over this too, eventually You just need to kill him. That'll end all of this easy misery." 

"Holy shit." I exclaimed at his shockingly casual words. "This is insane. How is any of this easy? That's definitely not something a psychiatrist would suggest." 

"Compared to everything else that's played out in our lives? This is really mundane." He scoffed into the mirror at my flailing reflection. "Now that I think back on it, Derek does have a tendency of falling into the habit of self-deception in his romantic relationships. Almost all of them involved someone dying. At the very least, someone gets stabbed. Or tortured. My sister took my memories when I cheated on my wife. She thought it was alright. I don't even remember being angry about it." 

Peter reminisced in a cavalier fashion, rubbing his face with a large hand while casually thinking of miseries past. He muttered, "I mean, yes, most of my family died because of his fucked up sexual escapades. I suppose it might be too much to hope he grows out of his murderous libido." 

That was a truth that I hadn't considered. I knew of it, but I didn't think of it. Hearing it now, with the voice of someone who lived through it, I could understand it. If I hadn't disagreed with it. 

"You think that excuses everything he did?" I whispered with a heavy heart. 

"No." He replied calmly. "Even with the confusion and the grief brought about by being a Werewolf, it doesn't excuse anything. He gains more than he loses. He was born with those things, he wasn't bitten into them. But the experiences that came with it shaped his life. While he was with you, he had a good reason to ignore the grief from loss. There was always something else that needed to be done. Another monster to fight. Another mystery to solve. Then one day, he had become alone with his own thoughts."

He slowly moved to the door, throwing the heavy bag on his back. I watched him move around as his words played back in my head. 

"Do you want my advice?" He asked suddenly. 

"I have a feeling you'll give it anyway." I replied. 

"For a price. But you can pay me back later." He smirked. "I know this will be difficult for you, because of what you're like. But you need to curb your curiosity for all the sordid details. I've always admired your curiosity, Stiles. But in this case, it's only holding you back. Understanding won't make my nephew any less of a whore."

I called out to him just he reached for the door handle and asked, "where are you going anyway?"

He stared at me blankly for a moment before changing his expression into one of disappointment. "Where do you think? To clean up your mess. You said you might have killed a guy. The last thing we need is someone sniffing around and tying that to our pack. And call Lydia, please. Her text messages are irritating." 

"What do you want?" I asked, stopping him from stepping away once again. "What's the price?"

Peter smirked in response, giving me a little wink before he left through the doors, leaving my question to linger unanswered in the air.

I stared after the door for sometime, lost in thought about everything we had discussed. This had been the first time I had articulated my grief in its entirety and in its apparent complexity for the first time. I held back at the support group out of a habit of keeping the secret of the supernatural world in my chest. But Peter had just laid my fears bare on the table. There had been no supernatural reason for Derek's infidelity. Was there? Maybe sometimes, a betrayal could just be that. Not out of militant brainwashing, or magic spores, or dark spells and evil creatures. Maybe sometimes the pain could just be senseless and cruel, if it had not been mystical. The worst of it was finally acknowledging a painful part of the whole truth. He had shared his life with someone else. I hadn't been the husband. I was the roommate. 

I moved and sat on the sofa once again, sighing heavily at the revelation. It was still painful. It was still my pain, no matter how mundane. I fished out my cell phone from my pocket and turned it on. Shortly after my phone had come back to life, it buzzed repeatedly as a flurry of notifications flooded the device. The notifications grew as a great number of text messages, missed call, voicemail, and new email notices popped up on screen. 

"Lydia." I said tiredly to myself, ignoring all the other notices from Scott, my school, and other currently undesirable people. Having made the decision to call her back, it only rang once before she picked up. 

"Stiles! Where the hell are you?" She asked angrily. 

"I'm in San Francisco." I explained tiredly, sighing quietly on the receiver. "I'm fine. I just, needed to get away."

"What happened?" She demanded, sounding haggard on the other end. 

"It's a long story. It'll take too long to say on the phone, so I'll tell you some other time. I just needed some time to think. I still need it." I explained. 

I heard her huff out an irritated breath on the other end. "Well, you can tell me tonight. We're in Berkeley. I can drive to San Francisco. Where are you?" 

I stilled at her words, my heart thumped hard on my chest. "You're here? How? When? Wait, what do you mean by we?"

I dreaded her answer. I hoped it would be something else. Someone else. Anyone else. But it wasn't. It wouldn't be. 

"Just me and your dad. We're here." She replied calmly as I suddenly doubled over, shutting my eyes closed and biting my lips tight. She had replied calmly as I worked to stop my world from falling apart all over again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay. Wow. I do read the comments and... thank you guys. This is overwhelming (in a good way). I mean, nerve wracking, yes. But I'm flabbergasted and thankful for everyone's reception and interaction with this story. We're actually getting close to the end if I don't decide to insert some more stuff in there. Like... maybe one more sexy thing? I'll see...
> 
> But yeah, I'll troll through all of the comments (so many!) and write a Q&A that I'll answer either tomorrow or Sunday. Then there'll be another chapter up too. I promise not to abandon this fic. >.<
> 
> Seriously. Reading all of your stuff has been mesmerizing and just so freaking interesting. I'm actually having a hard time trying to articulate how awesome you guys in the comments have been. Honestly, it kinda feels like I'm failing upwards here. And that's not just me being self deprecating. I'm not sure how the ending is going to be received, but hopefully it'll be at least acceptable.


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles has a bit of good to offset the bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay. It's been a busy week. I'll have another chapter up before Sunday's over. I split parts of this chapter so I could add one last sexy time with Stiles into the story. Mhm... maybe I can manage to add one more with Derek or Stiles before the end. But yeah. I wanted a happy sexy time Stiles experience... ish. 
> 
> More notes at the end.

I studied the cut on my hand as the water washed over me. It had run deep and had carved an angry, jagged, canyon across fingers and my palm. The gulley was a vivid red, with torn, black and yellow skin around the base. The blood had coagulated and stuck to the bandage that had covered it for far too long. It probably should have been stitched, but luckily there hadn't been any obvious signs of infection. It had taken far too long and with more care than I had the patience to practice to remove the thing from my skin without breaking the dried crust. I closed my eyes tightly and listened to the gentle cascade of the water on the bath floor. I lathered every inch of my body that I could reach with liquid soap. I followed and counted each movement as if it had all been choreographed into with an orchestra. 

I had scrubbed every inch of my skin five times with the loofah. At least, I had scrubbed whatever I had managed to reach. I made sure I had scrubbed between the toes and the fingers. I had scrubbed the back of my knees and my lower back. I had scrubbed my waist, my thighs, my chode, my balls and my dick as well as I could until it all started to feel just a little bit raw. I had poured a considerable amount of soap in my hand and used it to scrub my bottom clean, and even used my fingers to clean what I could manage up my rectum. I washed my hair three times. I had washed my face five times. I even gargled with the liquid soap. I gagged and vomited at the taste and pushed through the burn in my throat. I had stung my eyes far too many times. I might have let the water run too hot, and bathed my body in the heat and the steam until it had glowed a startling red. The burn and the itch was a different kind of pain that I could welcome. Later, by the time the bathroom fog had faded, sucked out by the deafening air vent, the pain and the stinging skin had also numbed and gone. Even at that time I couldn't help but wonder if maybe I should have spent more time trying to scrub myself clean. I couldn't help but think that something had been left over, that a tiny little stain that had been left behind. It felt of an omnipresent itch that threatened to spread out once again. 

After I had cleared the clouded mirror with a damp rag, I studied my face and my naked body. My reflection seemed the same as it had been a few days ago. The mirror reflected pale skin and tightly muscled arms from several years of running with hunters and wolves. They had been larger and more layered at one point, but a year of a indolence had chiselled them down into shadow of what they had once been. I had never been physically like Derek, Peter, or any of the other wolves. But there was a time, that i had been quite close. For a moment, I stray thought passed that whispered how much of a waste it had been, having such muscles on an atrophied man. It whispered sad things that thankfully were eventually smothered by the persistent rumble of the air vent.

But the tired face that look back in the mirror seemed to belong to a stranger. I reached down and used one of Anastasia's disposable razors and shaved the stubble that had grown over my face for the past few days. Then I scrounged around the cupboard and the drawers in that small downstairs bathroom until I found an electronic hair clipper. Without even another thought, I flipped the switch and relished in the feel of the vibration in my hand. I gripped the clipper tightly with both hands and ran it through my head without hesitation. The bathroom was filled with the sounds of the shearing and the high pitched hum of the clippers. By the time I finished, the man looking back at the mirror was someone else entirely. The hair was buzzed close to the skin, shorter than even what my shortest buzz cut had ever been, back before Scott had followed me into those woods. I suppose there might not have been much of a difference. But the one on the glass was, at that time, somebody else. It was someone new. It was someone, anyone, else other than the broken man I had been. I studied the eyes of a stranger who wanted and hoped for something better, eager to fill in the cracked and broken things with something more than the emptiness. There was an odd comfort in staring at the reflection of someone who vaguely looked like someone else. 

Lydia's voice echoed in my head repeatedly as I cleaned the day from my body. I traced the scar on my hand once again as I repeated the conversation in my mind. All of the suspicious parts of me hadn't lifted completely just by my one conversation with Peter. There were still voices that remained that questioned every statement and inflection that had been said. 

"Please, talk to me."

"I want to see you."

"What's going on? You're freaking us out." 

"Do you know where Derek is? He's not answering his phone." 

The voices in my head conversed fervently, taking apart every inflection and syllable that had been uttered by her in that short amount of time: _Lies_. _She lied_. _Her words caught in her throat_. _Was she being sarcastic_? _I think I heard her chuckle_. _Liar_. _Fucking liar_. 

If only thoughts could have been as easily removed like body hair, with just a quick, simple, swipe of a razor. Another quick thought passed by that it very well could. As long as the blade swiped in a very particular way...

I paused for a moment, stunned at the dark turn of my own line of thinking. Shaking my head roughly, I stored everything back as it was and left. 

"Oh. Dude." A voiced surprised me the moment I had exited the downstairs bathroom at Anastasia's condo. A thin familiar looking young man greeted me awkwardly, standing in the middle of the makeshift counselling room that would be acting as my makeshift bedroom for the evening. "Hi."

He body seemed more unwieldy than I had remembered. He had long limbs with a think frame, covered by a ratty old t-shirt underneath a plaid shirt one size too large for his body. He had torn, stained, blue jeans and a mess of unkempt hair on his head. 

"Oh. Hi. Dude." I greeted back, equally as awkward. I even managed a light wave as I stood before him, unsure of what to do. It took a moment of hard thinking before I placed the face in a specific memory. "You're from that meeting this afternoon."

"Yeah. Sat right there." He replied. "Came by cause I forgot something. There it is!"

He dived forward and pulled a tattered, black, bag from underneath one of the tables. He stood facing me for a few minutes, shifting his weight from one foot to another before speaking up once more. 

"Guy in the support group." I pointed out before rubbing the back of my shaved head awkwardly. "The one who I made out with at the club but can't remember."

"Yeah. Gavin." He replied, as he pointed to himself. He motioned towards the made up pull-out I had set up earlier and asked, "you're staying here?"

"Yeah. Anastasia is letting me crash here for the night while I figure some stuff out." I explained. I rubbed the back of my head and looked away from what I swore had been a pitying gaze. "I'd stay in my car, but it got towed."

"That sucks." He commiserated. 

I nodded in agreement, sighing at my own turn of bad luck. "Yep. Apparently it happens when you park next to a fire hydrant."

"Yeah, like, what you need water or something? And what's up with that name? Fire plus hydrant. Hydrant is a water faucet. So it's fucking like a 'fire water faucet'." He dithered.

"Mhm." I mumbled and nodded my head, not really knowing what to say and all to conscious of the fact that I was only covered by a damp piece of borrowed cloth. "I, uh, have enough money to stay in a motel or something. But I figured it might be cheaper. Not. To. Good time to not spend any money if I don't have to. And Anastasia offered earlier." 

"Yeah, I get that." He replied. "Better than the streets. Back when I first got to the city, I usually crashed in an alley in China Town. There was this good spot between an abandoned dry cleaners and a Chinese restaurant. The guys in the kitchen always separated the food in a clean bag and wrapped it tight before throwing it in the dumpster. I think they knew some kids would dive in for it later. Or something. So that was pretty cool."

"That's nice." I agreed awkwardly, not really knowing how to respond to a lifestyle I had never been subjected too. Somehow, I had found it easier to respond to existential or supernatural issues than socio-economic ones. "I'm not homeless." 

"No. Of course you're not." He said quickly. "Sorry. No. Yeah. I just meant, I know what it's fucking like being in between... houses." 

"Like alley ways." I replied. 

"Yes. Those can be found in between... houses. Alley ways man." He said stiltedly. 

"But I didn't mean that there was anything wrong with being homeless. I just didn't want to pretend. 'Cause, like. I technically have options. I just... don't want to take them, right now. 'Cause of things." I mumbled. 

"Oh, no, yeah. I didn't... I wasn't thinking that you were saying that. I totally get it." He replied. He popped his tongue at the end of his sentence and tapped his foot loudly. 

We stood in another minute of silence, save for the topping and the distance sound of a ticking clock, until my skin had almost dried itself, save for the parts still covered by the damp towel. 

"Are you tired? Do you wanna watch a movie?" He asked suddenly. 

"What?" I asked, surprised. 

"I was uh, planning on just going back to the shelter and watching a movie. But the kids there always crowd in and just won't shut up about random crap. So, if you want, we can watch it." His voice trailed off in the end. He ran his hand with black, painted nails through his thick head of hair. "But that's probably weird and stupid."

"What movie?" I asked.

"Um, Dune." He replied. "The David Lynch version." 

"Cool. Okay. Sure." I agreed, thinking that doing something simple and mundane would be a neat change of pace compared to the past few days. "It'd be nice watching something that doesn't involve my cheating husband in a gang-bang." 

"Uh. Oh. 'Kay." He said, still looking at me awkwardly.

"I need to change though." I pointed out. 

"Right! Fuck. Yeah. I'll uh, I'll be outside. Just yell when you're done." He prattled before rushing out of the room.

I dressed quickly, silently thankful for the unexpected kindness that Anastasia had shown me. It made me feel all the more guilty, causing her tremendous inconvenience after Peter never came back to the club for their next spot. He had left for my sake, but I could not confess that little fact to my benefactor. How would I? Instead, I chose to bask in the relief of having my own clean, clothes on my clean body.

"I'm not being pushy am I? 'Cause we just totally do it another time. Or never. Whatever, you know?" He said nervously as he drummed his thighs with excitable hands after I had let him back in. 

"No. It's fine. I had a short day, but it felt like it took up a few chapters of a long, drawn out, painful story." I explained, smiling softly. He smiled eagerly as he crossed the threshold, and I couldn't help but think how refreshing it was that someone actually seemed eager to see me. "One question though." 

"What's that?" He asked nervously, clearly taken aback by my sudden statement.

"Have you ever fucked one Derek Hale, SourWolf whatever, or a Sheriff from Beacon Hills?" I asked seriously. 

"Er. No? I don't know who any of those people are, or even what a SourWolf is." He said, the relief was evident on his face, likely having assumed that I was going to say something else. 

"Good. Because if you're lying, I'm probably gonna have to kill you." I replied with far more intensity and sincerity than I had intended. Probably. I had aimed for flippant, but my tone might have convinced even me that I had been genuine with the threat. "Maybe drive you insane first. _Then_ kill you. I've been told I'm really good at driving people crazy." 

"Well, I'm not afraid. Fear is the mind-killer." He said seriously in response, drilling at his temple with a stiff finger. 

"But I haven't even asked you to put your hand inside my little box yet, though." I joked back, having appreciated the reference. 

"The eighties box or the ought's box?" He qualified. "Ought's box sucked. The eighties scene was way more intense. Like he actually didn't want to keep his hand in the box, but chose to."

"So you want to chose to leave your hand in my box even though it'd be painful? Oughts Paul probably had a better time of it. But eighties Reverend Mother was way more sinister and probably had a better box." I agreed. 

"Okay. That's just confusing. Are you trying to convince me to put my hand in your box, or not? Was this whole conversation meant to have sexy undertones? Cause I'm pretty sure that was a painful experience for Paul in both versions." He laughed.

"Well no offence to the Reverend Mother, but I have a great box. It's an awesome box. There's candy inside. Lots of folks have wanted to put their hands through my box hole. Actually even yearned for the pain and melting flesh just for the chance to fist this hole." I rambled with an awkward laugh. I immediately regretted it the moment it had been said. But to my relief, Gavin had just laughed in a good natured way, eyes crinkled at the tips. 

I realized then that I couldn't remember the last time I had made someone laugh. Derek didn't use to laugh at my jokes. I eventually did, but it took a while. Although sometimes I suspected he only laughed because he thought I had expected him too. But that might have just been another one of the voices in my head, trying to convince me of the ways of the world so unlike how it actually was. But Gavin's laugh had been real, I was convinced of it. 

"Yeah. I wouldn't mind playing with your box hole." Gavin chuckled with a playful smirk. "Shit. I don't really know what I meant by that. Or I do? It's a weird visual." 

"You know usually people wait until after the movie before they talk about it. Or at least while they're watching." I pointed out as we made our way towards my pull out. 

"Did you want to watch it over there instead? We can move some chairs and some tables around. It'll be almost, kinda, comfortable." He said. 

"Nah. I've spent the past few days in constant discomfort and those plastic chairs are uncomfortable. I am going to _chose_ being comfortable." I replied honestly and patted the space beside me after jumping onto the pull out. I had gathered a bunch of the cushions and the pillows that Anastasia had provided and created a makeshift backrest for the both of us. 

"That's fine with me." He shrugged, his smile growing wider as he took off his shoes before jumping onto the empty space beside me. Pulling a sticker covered laptop from his backpack, he placed it on his lap and angled it enough for the both of us to see. "By the way, I actually _do_ like talking about the movie while watching it. The other shelter kids don't do that. They tend to yammer about other stuff instead." 

"Oh, that's a fucking relief. Me too." I chuckled with relief at his confession, which elicited another wide smile from him. 

Although initially awkward, we eventually settled into a relaxed and comfortable state after Princess Irulan's floating head finished her introductory exposition of the film's plot. Quite quickly, both of us settled into an enjoyable banter as we watched the film. It was nice closing my close day with something so enjoyable and mundane. All the more enjoyable was the discovery that we seemed to share a very similar sense of humour. 

"You think the Spice Girls were turned into virtual commercial spokespeople for the Spice, or the Arakis tourism bureau?"

"I think the Sardaukar in this version were secretly steampunk enthusiasts." 

"I loved how the Bene Gesserit in this version look like they're fighting an orgasm every time they use their powers."

"It would have been so cool if Salvador Dali had been the emperor and Orson Welles had been the Baron!" 

"Yeah, but, they would have had to write the Baron as drunk in almost every scene he'd be in." 

"Piter De Vries is such a scummy little scrub." Gavin grumbled after we reached the scene of Piter threatening Dr. Yueh's bound wife. 

"It's different in the book." I muttered, suddenly caught up by the despicable man's words. 

"What?" Gavin asked absently, his gaze still intent on the movie. 

"In the book, he says, 'I must not let my passion interfere with my reason'." I quoted.

"Is the box hole your passion or your reason? Where are we in this metaphor?" He asked teasingly. "What are you talking about?" 

"What? Sorry. That's what Piter De Vries said in the book. They changed it for the movie. He says it after he kidnapped and killed Dr. Yueh's wife. That's the dude that was played by the hologram dude in Quantum Leap." I elaborated after a glimpse at his confused face. 

"Yeah. I don't mind that they changed it to 'desire clouds my reason' instead. Too wordy for a movie." He nodded smartly to himself. "What brought that up?"

"Just started thinking about my husband." I admitted sadly.

"Makes sense." He shrugged at the revelation. "I mean, your husband sounds like a super scummy dude." 

"He didn't use to be, you know." I explained. "He was always sad but he always worked for something better. He's had a crap life. Not always. He came from a good family, but most of them died 'cause he fucked up."

"That sucks. Doesn't make him any less of a scumbag though. A shitty life doesn't excuse the shitty things you do to other people." He replied calmly. "Like look at Alia. She kicks ass here, even if they leaned way too heavily on the creepy-little-magic-kid trope. She basically matured way too early and went through too much intrigue for a four year old just 'cause she was magical. Then when she's older, instead of using all those experiences to be better than the people she killed, she turned into a tyrant." 

"Well, to be fair, she was corrupted by the implanted memories of her evil grandfather." I pointed out. 

"She's supposed to be this super kick ass character with super mental powers. I feel like she could have fought a bit harder instead of falling deeper into depravity because of all the voices in her head." He argued. 

"Yeah, I guess. But it's not that easy. Depends on the person I guess and the voices you have in your head. Some people are better at fighting the voices until they manage to find their own." I explained while the voices in my head laughed mockingly. 

"You sound like you've known a lot of people who've had other people in their head." He laughed jokingly. 

I stared at him seriously after I realized the accuracy of his flippant observation. "Actually, yeah. Believe it or not, I do. Huh. Weird."

"Okay." He replied, bemused. "How do they keep the voices out?"

"Mhm, distractions are one way to go, I guess. But it'd have to be a pretty good distraction." I noted, thinking about how I had managed the Nogitsune in the past.

"Alright." Gavin nodded before moving the laptop on his lap to the foot of the makeshift bed. Then with a determined face, he slowly moved towards me, his face hovered over mine for a few seconds before leaning in further to connect out lips. 

He leaned deeper into the kiss and I greeted him in turn, leaning my body forward to meet his. I reached up with a hand and pulled him deeper into me. The motion of it made him lose his balance, and Gavin's body collapsed into mine. We both huffed out a small grunt as our bodies collided before diving back into the kiss. I hugged him into my body and snaked my hands up his spine. I ran my hand up his neck to his hear and pressed his face deeper into mine. He moaned into my lips and pressed himself deeper into the kiss. His tongue darted out to lightly prod at my moist lips. I opened them slightly and met his slick tongue with my own as Gavin pressed his body closer to mine. He was the first to pull away. 

He grinned happily before he spoke with a raspy voice. "Wow. Okay. Distracting enough?"

"Yeah." I nodded. In the back of my mind I realized that it had been some time since I had been kissed like that. 

"I didn't force myself on you, did I? I thought I felt a vibe." He confessed as his body still hovered over mine. 

"Yeah." I nodded again. "I mean, no. That was good. That was a good distraction." 

"Want me to distract you again? Keep those voices away?" He asked teasingly. 

"What voices?" I whispered before pulling him back into my arms. 

He tasted of coffee and something sweet. He was eager with every kiss, and just as eagerly returned every caress of my hand. He straddled over my body and tucked both of his legs beside mine. I trailed little kisses on his lips, his cheek, and his jaw until I made my way to his neck. I breathed in the deeply, taking in the musk of his skin. I lightly licked at the crook of his neck, tracing his collar bone with my tongue. I relished in the taste of the salt on his skin that complimented well with the headiness of his musk. Regretfully I pulled away and held him in place as he tried to dive forward with another kiss. 

"Um, I can't have sex." I confessed. 

"What?" He asked, sounding confused and disappointed. 

"I haven't been tested after last night. Or this morning. Or, you know, after my... thing. When I did the stuff I can't remember." I explained. "So probably not a good idea to do any kind of sex until I do get tested." 

Comprehension dawned on his face and he nodded at my words. "Right. Yeah. Okay. We can do something else?"

"What?" I asked. 

He slowly moved his hand down and traced the outline of my hard cock over my jeans, and lightly placed more pressure on the bulge, which elicited a wistful groan from my lips. 

"I can just jack us off, if you want. I've had a lot of practice." He explained, moving in a way that pressed his equally hard eagerness against my own. 

I nodded enthusiastically as Gavin quickly leaned in to give a soft kiss on my neck. "Yeah, let's do that."

I quickly pulled my shirt off my body and threw it to the side. I shrugged at his inquiring face after his gaze studied my nude frame. 

"That shirt just got cleaned. I don't really have a lot of them right now." I replied to unasked question before moving to unbutton my own pants and his. 

"Right, okay yeah. Oh, fuck!" He cried out as I pulled his cock out of his tight jeans, the mass popping out rigidly, the tip already oozing out a clear liquid. 

I ran my thumb over the base of his head, spreading his precum around the skin. I grasped the length of his manhood and admired its girth. It wasn't as long as mine, but it had a very respectable heft to it, beating me with the width. 

"Holy shit your cock is beautiful." He whispered in admiration as he pulled it out of my boxers. He rubbed the slit of my dick as well, spreading the leaking precum around my cock head. 

I groaned against his body, breathing his musk through the unwashed fabric of his clothes. He grasped my manhood tightly before he gently stroked down, pulling my foreskin down until it revealed the flushed, red, head of my cock. He snaked his other hand down my body and into our laps before he gently cupped my balls into his palm. He wrapped them around his warm fingers before lightly squeezing and pulling at my nuts. 

"You have really big, beautiful balls man." He whispered admiringly, seemingly enthralled by the package in his hands. 

"I love how thick your cock is." I whispered back, gripping his manhood tighter in my hand. I moved my other hand to his shoulder and gripped tightly to maintain some balance between us. "I can barely fit my hands around it." 

Gavin moaned obscenely as I squeezed tighter, the act of which caused him to grip my package tighter in turn. I moaned in equal response as I nestled my face at the crook of his neck. I quickly moved my hand up and licked my palm, momentarily relishing the taste of his cock on my skin. I moved it back down and gripped his hot manhood before moving my hand in long, even strokes. He cussed under his breath as he leaned his head against mine. I felt his hot breath on my skin as he moved to manage his stroking to equal my pace.

In time we even began to pant and moan in unison, our heavy breathes and stuttered gasps began to fill the room underneath indiscernible dialogue and a dulled orchestra soundtrack. Eventually our pace began to grow frantic and uneven as our excitement began to reach its peak. By the time his hands moved to stroke me harder and faster, I was falling over to the edge. His thighs locked tighter against mine as he groaned against my temple and I felt his release between us as the wetness of it covered my fist. A particularly tight grip around my cock caused me to shoot my own, and my cum coated his shirt and my bare chest at the release. A bit of it even managed to hit my chin. 

We held each other for a little, panting against each other's body, relishing the moment. I stared at the thick release that coated my hand, enthralled by it. 

"I'm clean by the way." He whispered in the dim light of the room after catching my stare, seemingly realizing the meaning behind my gaze. "You look like you want to, you know..." 

"Good. I believe you." I whispered back before bringing the hand to my mouth. I licked the skin and tasted his release in my mouth, coating my tongue with the stuff. It was a very memorable taste, barely salty with a slight sweetness that reminded me of pineapple. I relished the taste of it before swallowing. 

I gave him a quick peck on the lips before I leaned forward and moved him down.

"Whoa!" He gasped in surprise as I moved him to his back. 

I moved my way down his body and began to lap and lick at the softened member coated in his cum. I took it in my mouth and suckled on his soft cock, even inserting my tongue in between his foreskin and cock head. I licked the release that coated his pubic hair and even lightly suckled at his balls before swallowing everything that I had collected. In the meantime he moaned and lightly thrashed on the bed and almost knocked his forgotten laptop, still playing the movie, onto the ground.

"You taste like pineapple." I explained after I finished my ministrations on his spent cock. 

"Holy shit, that was amazing." He replied tiredly with a happy smirk on his face. "I promise that I wasn't expecting that. But I'm happy it happened." 

"Unexpected indeed." A voiced called out from the dark. It pulled us out of our bliss with a flurry of flying limbs and surprised gasps on Gavin's part. 

He scrambled quickly on the bed, tucking his manhood back in his jeans before jumping out of the bed. 

"Shit. Sorry. We were just, um..." Gavin blathered awkwardly at the figure of a man in the doorway. 

"Oh, I know what you were doing." The voice said with amusement. The figure stepped forward into a spot of streetlight and revealed Peter's smiling form. 

"Peter. How long have you been there?" I asked, unamused at the sudden interruption. 

"Long enough to enjoy a bit of the show." He revealed with a tooth smile. He turned to Gavin's frozen form. "And you are?"

"Gavin!" He replied far too loudly. He cleared his throat awkwardly and stared back at the other man who just maintained that disturbingly saccharine smile. "And going, I guess?"

Gavin turned to me inquiringly, shifting his glances between Peter's smiling form and my own unimpressed expression.

"Peter. Gavin. Gavin. Peter." I offered dryly before meeting Gavin's inquiring gaze. "It's fine. Yeah, I know him. I had a good time. I really needed that."

Gavin smiled wide at my words, his eyes crinkling at the edges. "Yeah. Me too. We should do it again..."

"You can go now." Peter interrupted firmly, still smiling. 

"Yeah, okay. Right." Gavin said in a bluster of activity. He quickly packed his things into his bag before fast walking towards the door, maintaining a wide berth around Peter's unmoved form. He stalled at the doorway and gave me a last a look with a gentle smile. "We should distract each other again sometime." 

"You know where to find me." I replied with a wave, eliciting another wide smile from him. 

"Goodbye Gavin." Peter said sweetly. The younger man's smile quickly vanished at the farewell and he quickly made his way out of the building. 

"You moved on pretty fast." Peter said the moment Gavin had rushed out. He slowly walked towards me as I leaned back against my makeshift bed. "You're technically still married you know." 

"Pretty sure my husband moved on first. And I don't care. I wanted it, he wanted it, so we both got it. I think I was due." I replied coldly. 

"Oh you certainly were." He agreed as he moved closer towards my bed. "My blind nephew is far too ignorant to realize what he's left behind." 

"Whatever." I muttered before I moved to leave the bed but was suddenly stopped by Peter as he quickly appeared beside me, clutching my shoulders with his warm hands. He slowly pushed me back down against the pillows, his eyes staring intensely into mine. "What are you doing?" 

He studied my face for a few seconds before moving his gaze all over my exposed body. I felt his hands stiffen on my shoulders, but the grip never became unpleasantly tight. I watched a tongue dart out quickly to lick his lower lips and heard his breathing becoming rougher. 

"What are you doing?" I asked again, my voice quieter than before as I followed every move by the man curiously. 

He began to lean in slowly towards my face, his gaze still pointed down. I pressed myself back at first but stopped as his head got closer to mine. 

"Tell me to stop." He whispered under his breath, but it was still clear in the dark, quiet, room. 

I remained silent as I continued to watch his advance, his face still pointing down at my body. Then before our heads would collide, he moved his face up and I felt a long, wet, swipe up my neck and onto my chin. By the time Peter had made his way completely up, I had a clear view of his aroused face. His eyes were shut and his tongue was sticking out and coated by my release. He pulled the flesh back into his mouth and moaned at the taste. I watched his Adam's apple bob as he swallowed my release. By the time he faced me with open eyes, they were glowing an electric blue. 

"Tell me to stop." He said once again with a raspy rumble. Once again, I remained quiet. 

He moved completely onto the bed, his body hovering over mine. I leaned back and watched him as he made his way down my form, occasionally licking parts of my exposed body that bore the signs of my release. He began to lick and suckled down my abs, bathing the skin with his saliva. I watched as he licked and ate the copious amounts of pent-up cum that had coated the lower half of my body. It was an obscenely beautiful sight to behold as the older man licked the length of my soft cock before enveloping it with his mouth. The suckling noise echoed throughout the empty room as he nursed on my cock, seemingly bringing it back to life. He gripped my waist as my cock hardened back up in his mouth. I felt the rumbling of his throat and he worked to take more of me deeper into himself. I even felt my cock head hit the back of his throat. Instead of chocking, he rumbled even more.

"Oh, fuck!" I exclaimed at the sensation. My cock was exceptionally sensitive at having to be aroused once again in such a short amount of time. 

Peter started to bob his head at my arousal, his suckling and sloppy noises echoing in the darkness. I started to thrust my hips up to meet his mouth, but he kept me down with his firm hands. At one point, Peter darted his tongue out to bathe the underside of my hardness with his spit, and even moved to clean and suckle on my balls with his mouth. My next release was quick, and Peter caught all of it into his mouth. Looking down I saw the man looking up at me with glowing blue eyes as he swallowed everything that I gave him, his lips stretched obscenely around my cock. 

My body collapsed, spent, on top of my bed, panting heavily in the darkness. Below me Peter rumbled approvingly at the act. Then just as quickly his weight vanished on top of me and he was no where to be found. I caught his form on the side in the darkness of the open bathroom, his eyes glowing in the dark. 

"Anastasia's coming." He said quietly in the dark, just enough for me to have heard the words. 

I nodded tiredly and quickly moved my body underneath the covers and feigned sleep. A minute later, I heard the faint creak of the door opening. I resisted the urge to open my eyes and worked instead to maintain my breathing. By the time I heard the door clicking shut and the distant sounds of high heels making their way upwards, the weight on the bed had returned. 

I opened my eyes and looked into the eyes of the man watching me. 

"That was probably a mistake. But I don't care. It felt good." I explained. 

"And it'll probably drive Derek crazy when you bring it up later." He elaborated with a raised eyebrow. 

"Yep." I replied with pop. 

"Well, I don't regret it." He said, to my surprise. "Feeling good is probably a change for you after so long. I don't mind helping out."

"Don't make that out as something bigger than what it actually was." I said and narrowed my eyes for emphasis. 

"I'd be a far better mate, you know." He said slyly, his words dripped with oil. "Much better than my fool of a nephew." 

I rolled my eyes at his creepy attempts at seduction. "No. And I'm not going to be looking for relationships for a while after all of this is over."

His smirk widened at my words. "Keeping it casual? I can do that too." 

"No means no, ya corpse." I said tiredly. 

"Don't let my nephew's issues and callousness ruin you." He replied.

"Ruin me? What the fuck does that mean?" I asked, riled up by his words. 

"I mean, just because he betrayed you doesn't mean everyone will." He explained.

"Ah. Psycho Psych Wolf is in the house. You know I question your credentials. But even if they were real, I'd be insane to take your advice." I said honestly. 

"Even if they were good ones? And would make you better?" 

"I don't think anything can make me better right now." I replied sadly. 

"Then, the least I can do is help make you forget." He said with that mischievous smile of his. "I can certainly do it a lot better than... Gavin."

"What? Sex me up so good that I'll even forget my name?" I mocked. 

"Do you really want to? I can do that for you." He replied seriously as he narrowed his eyes. They flashed a bright blue before he continued. "With or without the sex. I can help you forget. If not the memories, then just the emotions. I can move something else in its place. You'd stop being in pain. I can help you more than just talking to you."

"Can you?" I asked quietly, surprised by the question. I wondered if he was serious.

"Yes." 

"Can you make me stop loving Derek? Help me love someone else instead?" I asked curiously. My question was partly sincere. It would have been a much easier route than living through and getting past the pain, after all. 

"Yes." He whispered in my ear as his left hand traveled up and caressed my neck. "But it has to be your choice. I want it to be your choice." 

"How?" I asked breathlessly as I stared into his eyes. 

"I have my sister's claws. I've become quite adept at using them." He explained close to my face. His breath tickled my skin. "I even used them today to clean up your little mess."

His confession suddenly pulled my attention in a different direction. I had almost forgotten what he had done for me tonight. 

"What do you mean? Did I..." My voice trailed of uncertainly as I struggled to remember what exactly happened. 

"Well, if you're curious, you can watch it yourself." He replied by placing a little tape on my bare chest. "And all three men survived." 

"Three?" I asked, shocked by the revelation. 

"Oh yes. You cracked a man's skull in one room, broke both knees of another in the hallway towards the exit, and almost crushed the esophagus of the bouncer at the front." He replied calmly as he leaned back into a sitting position. "Jack's in a coma, but alive. The one in the hallway is in a considerable amount of pain, but he'll live and recover fully. The bouncer will survive, but I don't know if he'll be able to talk again." 

"Shit." I muttered, uncertain about how well to take the news. I had only thought it had been two people at most, having no recollection of the third (or rather second?) person altogether. Although I felt as though I could live with Jack's condition, both the second (or third?) man and the bouncer hadn't deserved what I had done to them. Perhaps. Could I have hoped that maybe in a way, I had defended myself? That the violence had been justified? "I haven't practiced or worked out in a year."

"Well, it seems Scott and Chris trained you _very_ well. Watch the tape if you really want to know. Or destroy it, I don't really care. But rest assured I've cleaned up after your little bout of ultra-violence. None of the parties involved will remember a thing." He said with a wicked smile. 

"What do I owe you?" I asked, worried of ever owing something to the man. But to my surprise, he just shook his head.

He smiled and licked his lips. "We'll call it even." 

He moved to his feet and walked towards the door quietly with astonishing speed. He paused by the door frame, his hand on the handle and turned to face me.

"Lydia doesn't know, if you were wondering. I had a little chat with her tonight after you turned her down." He explained. "I know you might not believe me, and why should you, but she didn't know. So, give her a break tomorrow for not knowing and for not being there. You'll need someone else in your corner that isn't a Hale."

He had gone before I could even respond, his body quietly melted into the dark.

It was only later on that I realized I had forgotten to ask one crucial thing. Did Derek find out I had been at that club? That I had been with Jack? That I had almost killed three people because of his cheating ways? What did Derek know? 

Eventually all these questions as well as the considerable amount of post-coital bliss lulled me into a very welcome, deep, sleep. 

By the time I arrived at the coffee shop the next day, I was fully caffeinated and felt more relaxed than I had ever been. I even had enough time to have breakfast with Anastasia, who provided a healthy serving of chicken and waffles coated in maple syrup, before I left to meet Lydia. I saw her walking down the street before she saw me through the shop window. He face looked harried and seemed to have been muttering to herself. She stopped several times and seemed to be thinking of something difficult before shaking her head clear of her troublesome thoughts. She was almost in front of the shop by the time she had realized I had seen her coming. She stopped in her tracks, her body frozen as she stared at me with worried eyes. I watched her breath out deeply before marching towards the door. I just followed her calmly with my gaze.

She was dressed smartly in a starling blue, Rorschach patterned, blouse with a red leather jacket on top of it. She wore skin tight blue jeans accessorized with a small red bag hanging from a long gold chain. She looked as impeccable as ever. 

"I didn't know." She blurted out, her face evened out in a forced calm. Her eyes though were intense and here voice had been strong and as even as her face. 

"So I've been told." I nodded calmly. 

For a moment she looked surprised before it morphed into one of realization. "Peter told you."

I just nodded in response. 

"You talk to Peter." She said this more as a statement than a question. I just nodded again and her face shifted into one of consternation as a response. "Okay, that's disturbing."

" _You_ talked to Peter." I pointed out the obvious. 

"Well, obviously _I'm_ disturbed." She said smartly before she slowly moved to the seat next to me. 

She sat facing me for some time quietly, studying my face. I returned the silence with my own, keeping it as even as I could. The cafe was relatively quiet and empty, the two of us being the only customers, while the lone barista had gone to the back some time ago. 

"I don't know what to do here." She confessed awkwardly. 

"Neither do I." I agreed. "You're the one who came all the way down here though. Brought my dad with you too. Aren't you supposed to be in Cambridge?"

"Oh." She replied, surprised at my question. "You don't know."

"I don't know a lot of things. Kinda my biggest problem right now. Just good 'ol John Snow walking around glowering at everything. So what is it this time?" I muttered. "Pregnant? Kicked out of school? Another world ending supernatural threat? Did someone die?"

"Yes." She said seriously. 

I stilled at her words, my mouth gaped in response and immediately regretted my snarky commentary.

"Oh. Who?" I managed to ask.

"My dad." She replied and quickly shook her head as if she had anticipated my next question. "Not supernatural. Heart attack. The school let me drop the semester part way, but I only get a partial refund for it. And I had to provide a death certificate to prove the death of a close family member." 

"Jesus Christ, why didn't you tell me?" I replied in a panic.

"Well, I called you a few times but you never answered. And by the time you called back it was already after the funeral and you sounded overwhelmed." She explained. "It was fine."

"No, it isn't!" I insisted, embarrassed by my apparent indifference. "Holy shift, I'm so sorry."

"Look, it's fine. I get it. I go to school too. And you don't have the luxury of being as brilliant as I am." She replied haughtily as her the corners of her lips quirked with a suppressed smile. 

"This isn't a joke, Lyds. I'm so fucking sorry. I didn't know. Nobody told me. Why didn't anybody tell me?" I asked, suddenly getting angrier at having been deprived of this information. "Did Derek know?" 

"No. He didn't know either." She insisted. "I swear he didn't. Scott and I decided that this wasn't really something that either of you needed to disrupt your lives over." 

"Disrupt our lives? What are you talking about?" I asked, flabbergasted by her explanation. "We're supposed to be fucking pack, aren't we? Or am I missing something here?"

"No, we are!" She insisted seriously. Of all the people in the pack, it took her the longest to accept her place in it. But after she did, she relished her place in it despite her own distance with school. In fact, the last time we had talked, she had been taking accelerated classes with a full load, sometimes more, every semester just so she could graduate earlier and get back to Beacon Hills as soon as possible. "God, I know how this sounds. But we weren't doing it to leave you out. We just thought that you already had enough on your plate that we didn't think you needed to drop everything just to come to the funeral. It was quick. I just stayed behind for my mom who was having a hard time of it."

"Lydia..." I began sadly but once again she interrupted with another frantic explanation. 

"It really is fine. He already checked out of my life a while ago. It was sad and it was painful, but it wasn't the end of the world. He could have kept in touch more after the divorce, but he chose not to. So it really is fine. I'm fine. My mom's fine. We're fine." She insisted. "And you're dad was right. It wasn't really a reason for you and Derek to come down over." 

"Wait, my _dad_ told you not to tell me?" I asked, shocked by the revelation. 

"No! Stop. That's not what I meant!" She exclaimed. "I meant that he agreed with my decision not to disrupt your life. Yes, it wasn't trivial, but excluding you isn't some big conspiracy to push you out of the pack or to hurt you in some way. Please believe that." 

"Did you know? Or were you like me? Just so fucking ignorant of the fuck that my husband fucked my dad?" I said angrily. 

"What?" She exclaimed loudly, her shrill pitch even surprised me out of my anger. "He what?"

"Derek fucked my dad the evening before we got married." I explained. "There's a video of it. Did you know?"

"No!" She replied, her face reflected a horror that I had never seen on her. Not even when she had faced literal creatures of horror. "No. Stiles, I didn't know. I swear."

She moved her hand to cup her mouth, her lower jaw trembled at my confession. I watched a flurry of emotions cross her face as she tried to make sense of the news had I just relayed. It seemed sincere and I couldn't help but think back to Peter's insistence that she really didn't know. 

So many thoughts flooded my mind at that point. I didn't know. Why did I expect her to know? What kind of person did I think she was that she would have known and not tell me? When did I stop trusting her? When did I start even remotely considering that she could? Had Derek's betrayal destroyed all of the trust I had left to give? 

"When did we get here?" I asked sadly, as the revelation of the omission of her father's death and my abject distrust of Lydia highlighted my isolation from the pack. "When did we get to the point that you guys stopped telling me stuff? That I stopped asking? That I stopped believing you? When did it happen?"

"It shouldn't have happened. I'm sorry." She replied sadly as she reached over and squeezed my hands in her own. "And I'm sorry about Derek. I'm sorry about you dad. I'm sorry for not knowing. I'm sorry for not being there. I'm sorry for ever making you think that you couldn't come talk to me about it." 

I was quiet throughout her apologies. It had not been solicited, but it was gladly offered. I felt tremendous relief at the act, and even began to think that it hadn't been necessary at all. Although it had been nice to hear. 

"You didn't know?" I asked quietly, suddenly self conscious about my shame being put out in the public despite that fact that we were still the only people in that room. 

"No. I wish I did. I wish I knew that something like this would have happened." She confessed and sighed deeply with her eyes shut. "I should have said something on your wedding day."

"What do you mean?" I asked curiously. 

She opened her eyes and stared into mine as her hands tightened against my own. "I'm sorry, but I thought it was stupid. I really, really thought it was stupid that you were getting married so young." 

"What? Seriously? Why didn't you say anything?" I asked, surprised at her revelation. 

"'Cause I thought you knew what you were doing. You don't really listen to people if they tell you not to do something. You've always done what you wanted to do." She explained quickly. "But I should have been a better friend. I mean especially after I read the stuff that Deaton gave me, I really freaked out. I was gonna ask you about it before the ceremony. But you were in love. You loved Derek and you seemed so sure and so happy. And I guess it was just one of those things that I couldn't understand. But I think that maybe I could have done better."

"What stuff that Deaton gave you?" I asked again, more confused that before. I was also growing more frustrated at the fact that I was the one who seemed perpetually confused. 

"The mating manual." She said as if pointing out the obvious. 

"There's a _manual_?" I said with shock. 

"You have a copy. He gave you a copy. I saw him give you a copy after you told everyone you and Derek were getting married." She explained. 

I tried to dredge up any memory that sounded remotely similar to her explanation, and all I could come up with was a vague memory of Deaton pulling me aside, congratulating me, and handing me a gift for the event. 

" _That_ was a mating manual?" I flailed with shock, almost knocking myself off my seat. "He didn't say anything about that being a manual or anything! Why would there even _be_ a mating manual? What the hell is a mating manual?" 

"Yeah, he did. You seriously didn't read it? What?" She exclaimed with surprised. To my astonishment, she event slapped my shoulder, hard, at the revelation. "What the hell are you doing mating with a Werewolf and not know what you were getting into?" 

"What the hell, Lyds? Stop hitting me!" I snapped back. "I was getting married! I had to set up a wedding in like three days. You know how hard that is? I didn't have the time to read it. I thought it was wedding gift!" 

"You always read stuff. The one time when you're supposed to, and you don't? You read stuff all the time! You read too much stuff! You fucking write and read fanfics for fuck's sake!" She exclaimed, slapping me on the shoulder again. "How could you forge a mate bond without knowing what it mean."

"Fuck, ow! Stop it! You're acting like Peter right now." I snapped. 

Her mouth hung opened in shock before her face contorted with disgust and she slapped me again. "You take that back!"

"Fuck, stop! I know it was stupid!" I barked. "I know that I'm stupid. Or we were stupid. I should have looked it up. I should have know about it. I still _don't_ know much about it. But I know that I loved him and that I wanted to marry him. I know that it fucking _sucks_ that my mate ripped my fucking heart out. I know how much it fucking hurts that I don't have him anymore. I know that it fucking sucks that I want to hurt him back. It sucks because I still think of him as my Derek. I hate it that I do. Because I hate him, Lyds. I hate that I want to hurt him too. I hate that I can't make the hurting stop. And I just want it to fucking stop. I just want to feel good again. I just want to be me. I want to be with him and everything's alright and this was all just a big, fucking nightmare. I just want to not want to kill my own fucking father! I hate the fact that I want that. And it's so fucking exhausting to keep on hating. I'm just so tired and I want something else. I need someone to help me have something else." 

My voice had trailed off in the end. Even to my ears I sounded tired and completely devoid of hope. A sound to my right pulled both of our attention on a surprised and embarrassed looking barista holding a plate of fresh cookies. With wide eyes like a deer caught in headlight, she carefully placed the baking tray on the counter and backed out of the room and back into the kitchen. 

Without another word, Lydia dives forward and pulled me into a tight hug. I hugged her back. We held each other in silence for quiet a while, putting all of our grief and our sympathies in that prolonged embrace. We held each other so tightly that at a certain point, I felt her heartbeat on my chest. By the time we pulled away, her eyes were watery and her faced was red with grief. She put her hand on my left cheek and leaned in to place a kiss on the other. I couldn't help but smile at the contact. She then stood up and slowly pulled me to my feet. 

"Come on." She said with a broken voice before she cleared her throat of the phlegm that had built up with our exchange of grief. 

"Where?" I asked. 

"Come on!" She insisted as she pulled me towards the door. I pulled back as a sudden thought flashed through my mind. 

"You're not taking me to my dad, are you? 'Cause I'm not ready for that." I said nervously. 

"What? No, of course not. You said over the phone that you didn't want to see him yet." She said seriously. "You can choose to go see him when you're ready. When you want to. On your own terms. I'm taking you somewhere else." 

"Where?" I asked again. 

"We're going on day out." She explained as she forced a smile on her face. "The whole day is going to be just us going out, and enjoying San Francisco. I'm thinking de Young and the Exploratorium. Then to the Musée Mécanique since you've rambled about that place since we were fourteen. Then we can walk around Fisherman's Wharf before eating dinner at Katsuya. Then after _that_ , we can do the evening tour of Alcatraz." 

"Yeah, sounds good but that's not possible. You like have to buy Alcatraz tickets a year in advance if you want to do the evening tours." I explained calmly. I had tried to get on those tours, but I never had enough time or luck to snag any of the tickets in time. It was also a shock to realize that despite the fact that I had been here for so long, that I actually hadn't taken the time to go to any of the other places she had listed.

I probably shouldn't have been surprised when Lydia just rolled her eyes and response and clicked her tongue at me. "Please. I can get tickets. That's not a problem." 

"Of course you can." I mumbled tired, realizing the considerable amount of emotions that had just been exchanged in such a small amount of time. In the corner of my eye, I saw the barista had curiously peeked out from behind the kitchen curtains, but rushed back in after realizing I had noticed. "I need to pick up my car though. Since we're all good, or whatever, I was hoping you'd drive me to pick it up?"

"Along with a change of clothes. What the hell are you wearing?" She asked with a critical eye. 

I looked down at my outfit and shrugged. I was dressed in a ratty old Rolling Stones black t-shirt, a tight and torn, black, skin-tight jeans, as well as a one-size too big leather jacket. It was far from my normal look, but Anastasia had been far too enthusiastic with the task of assembling my outfit from things left behind in the lost & found. I didn't have room to complain. All of my clothes had been left behind at the apartment and I still hadn't mustered the courage to go back and get them. 

Lydia nodded seriously before grasping my hand tightly into hers. "Then we'll go get your car and then your clothes." 

"I don't want to go back Lydia. Not yet." I resisted, shaking my head at the thought of seeing Derek again. Maybe he was even with my dad. I could have asked. Lydia would have known. Was my dad with Derek right now? Had he put up much of a fight when I told her over the phone that I didn't want to see him? Even if I had been relieved that he hadn't shown up with Lydia, a part of me couldn't help but wondered why he never did. It was exhausting always having to articulate one's fears. I hoped that it was better to avoid certain fears until the moment when I no longer had a choice but to face them. 

"You don't have to come up. I will. I'll just grab a bunch of clothes and any other stuff you want me to. I'll stop all of them from coming downstairs. I'll pack up as much of your things as I can and we can go. In fact, _he_ should be the one that should be out on the fucking streets without anywhere to go. _He_ should be the one who has to wear hand me downs and old people's discarded clothes." She spat out bitterly. At that time, her anger made me really happy. "You don't ever have to see them until you're good an ready. On your own terms." 

I smiled at her words and nodded in agreement and let the woman who I had been in love with for most of my adolescent life pull me out into the light of the morning sky. My heart already felt lighter even when we were still drying to the impound lot. Suddenly, the more than a year apart seemed like nothing as we fell back into a happy groove of filling each other on the other things in our life. I listened to Lydia as she raved about her classes and excitedly rambled about things that I couldn't understand. She seemed happy, eager, and excited about her future which infected my own disposition and even made me excited about my own. I talked to her about my criminology classes and about my slowly forming desire to apply to the FBI Academy in Quantico. I hadn't realized it had been so long since I last talked to someone about how I aimed to shape my future. Doing so further convinced me at that point that, indeed, I had one. 

To my embarrassment, and her insistence, she even paid the impound fee for my car. In a little under an hour, we had already fetched my car and filled it back with enough gas to run for awhile. We took separate routes on the way to my old home, but I was disappointed to find that I had reached our destination first. 

"Sorry!" She cried after she picked up on the first ring of my call. In the background I could hear the loud honking of cars and the cries of annoyed drivers.

"Where are you?" I asked quietly in my car, hunched down in the driver's seat as if I was on one of our old stakeouts. 

"There's a jackass on the road that's holding up traffic. GPS says I'll be there in five minutes. I'll be there soon." She replied before she hung. 

I huffed out a frustrated breath and sank myself deeper into the seat while keeping a careful eye out at the entrance of the building. I wasn't that far from the entrance, but I had parked at the furthest free space that I could find that still had a clear view of the front doors. I knew we were far enough that Derek wouldn't be able to hear me at all. Obviously, considering how high up the apartment was. But that couldn't stop my abject paranoia. 

I kept an eye out on the clock with tremendous impatience, counting down Lydia's quoted time. I moved my eyes bank and forth between the dash clock and the front doors in an aggressively obsessive manner that would have worried anyone that had seen me. That's how I saw him exit building. His muscular form was easy enough to recognize. He was casually strolling out of the building, without a care in the world, completely focused on his phone while walking. Like the asshole he was. Then he smiled widely. It was a genuine, eager, happy smile. And it make me so fucking angry. Before I could think deeper into it, I found myself rushing out of my car towards his casually strolling form.

He must've heard me coming as his attention quickly snapped from his phone towards my rushing form. The smile on his face melted into one of surprise then shock. He raised both hands in the air as I marched towards him.

"Stiles, wait a minute!" He pleaded. 

"Fuck you." I just spat out as I came within hitting distance. I lunged forward and swung my fist towards his face. 

He quickly sidestepped the punch, and I narrowly missed his face as he stepped aside.

"Stiles. I know you're angry. But please, we can talk." He pleaded, his hands still in the air. 

"Fuck you, Ace!" I snapped bitterly before lunging forward again. This time I moved in that way that Chris had taught us to quickly reach an opponent with just a few steps. Just as I reached the right distance, even had the time to register the surprise on his face, I swung my fist up in an uppercut towards his chin. But once again, to my surprise, he sidestepped it with ease. 

"Dammit, Stiles! Stop!" He cried out. "I don't want to hurt you!"

"But I want to hurt you." I exclaimed. 

This time I rushed forward and feinted to the left before snapping to my right, towards the direction he had lunged to get away. I put as much force on my right fist while pouring as much hatred onto my left. As I swung my right fist towards his face he, once again, avoided it by lightly leaping to his left. At the instant that move registered in my mind, the focused anger and hatred I had poured into my left first reached a crescendo. I quickly swung my fist up towards the direction I anticipated he would appear in, feeling my spark crackle right into my bones. I had been right. That genuine look of astonishment on his face as my face connected to his left cheek was priceless. The force of it pushed his momentum in the opposite direction, and his body contorted from the conflicting desire of where he wanted to go versus the direction where the force pushed him into. His body twisted sharply and he stumbled in a rolling, heaping, mass onto the floor until he slammed against the building's wall. 

"Fuck!" He cried out as he coughed out a glob of blood onto his fist. "How the hell..."

"There's more where that came from you home-wrecking jackass." I seethed out as I further tightened my hands into fist. "Now get up so I can beat you down."

"Stiles!" I heard Lydia's voice behind me. Soon enough I see her running across the lot towards us. 

"What are you doing?" She asked with surprise as she glanced at Ace, who had staggered to his feet before spitting out another mouthful of blood. 

"That's Ace. He fucked my husband." I explained angrily, my rage preventing me from stringing more elaborate words together. 

Lydia's face snapped to me in surprise, her eyes widened at my revelation. 

"Oh." She managed to say before her face contorted into one of anger and disgust. "Asshole!"

She had screamed the word loudly as she swung her arm towards Ace's tottered form. Despite Ace's movements from before, Lydia's hit reached him in one go. Ace seemed surprised to as his eyes widened momentarily as Lydia's fist reached his cheek. As the sound of her fist slamming into his face cracked in the air, a bright, red, silhouette of light burst out from Ace's body. It was quite quick and brief and seemingly unintended. Ace staggered back a bit once more, but managed to regain his balance quickly. He suddenly snapped his attention to Lydia with shocked and confused eyes.

"How did you...?" He asked, his voice trailed off at the tail end of his shock. 

"Oh my god." Lydia gasped, clearly having seen the form just as well as I had done. 

"You son of a bitch." I muttered before saying it again with a snarl. "You bastard!"

I snarled the curse as I lunged forward once more at the man who, for a brief flash, had been surrounded by the silhouette of a red fox. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Was that Lydia conversation rushed? I deleted a bunch of stuff, and now I'm kinda regretting it. Let me know if it doesn't seem fulfilling or balanced then I can go back and change it. After all, all of you are basically my Beta readers. XD 
> 
> I actually wrote a bunch of stuff where it's just Lydia and Stiles hanging out and having a good time, like Lydia had said, and then the end. But it felt like it lagged the story a bit so I omitted it and opted the "let's get your stuff first" route to move the plot along instead. I mean sure, it would have meant more Happy Stiles time. But I figured I can still do that later? 
> 
> Anyway, next week. Confrontation with Ace and Derek appears in the story again. Then the Sheriff.


	14. Break:  Q&A

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the Q&A and not actually Chapter 14. I nitpicked the questions I answered cause I don't want to address anything that would reveal too much of future chapters. 
> 
> I know I said I was posting a chapter tonight. But I'm sorry. The action sequences of the next chapter are so freaking difficult. My notes are just along the lines of "Lydia & Stiles v. Ace" and "they use powers - imagine cool action sequences. See if you can insert Crouching Tiger like stuff". I'm struggling a bit with them. I've written the post fight stuff so I just need to write the part where they get to that post-fight scene. I'll try and not take too long with the fight sequence. At the very least I hope it won't be me just summarizing it in asterisks. Like: *They fight, Ace gets kicked in balls and explodes*. Then the rest is the story as per normal. I'm not saying Ace gets kicked in the balls and explodes, though. That was just an example.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everyone, thank you very much for reading this fic. Your enthusiasm for this story has really driven me to keep writing. I am 100% intent on finishing this fic. I've kinda explained it before but I actually have written the end of this fic. I've written plot points and specific scenes. Mainly cause sometimes the tedium of certain scenes gets to me because I really wanted to get to this other part. So I end up writing those scenes and then just filling in the blanks in between. Quite a bit I've had to rearrange chapters because the stuff I write in the middle gets longer or gets taken out entirely. Then I might end up needed to rewrite some stuff I've written ahead of time to accommodate these additions and changes. 
> 
> I thank you very much for all of your patience and I am so overwhelmed by your response for this fic. I know it isn't an easy fic to get into. It's kinda mean actually. But your enthusiasm has been a major driving force with me pushing through the slow days. It helps that COVID has me housebound and that I'm working half days in my job but doing it remotely. In my other fics, I just got exhausted sometimes after driving home/transitting home from work. Bu with this one? When I get an idea about a scene or dialogue I want to write, I now have the luxury of just switching computers (cause I work on my laptop) and then just quickly writing that scene or making a note about it. Thank you for reading this, it has been an absolute pleasure reading you guys theorize and discuss so energetically about something that I wrote. I hope I do the story justice as a whole in the end. Stay safe out there folks!

  1. ) **Do you regret having the Sheriff sexually involved with Derek? Do we find out more about why he slept with Derek knowing full well he's engaged to his son?**



A: 1st part - Nope! 

2nd part - Yep! I have a reason for it and it's not going to make Stiles any happier or resolve anything really. 'Cause the fact is - he still did it. Stiles will find out (in a way) why he did it. But the answer won't be any much of a comfort. I've actually put hints in the story as to why the Sheriff did it... 

2.) **Are we going to find out more about the mating manual?**

A: Yes. The next few chapters will address this. I elaborate more on this on question 11 below.

3.) **Has Ace tampered with Derek & Stiles' relationship? **

A: Yes. Definitely. Supernaturally? Well, since I've already revealed he's supernatural, I'm fine with admitting that yes, he did. BUT. Be warned. It does not absolve Derek. Someone actually answered this (or theorized about it) in the comments. Like, in pretty good lore driven detail. I even ended up talking to my partner about this and was like, "... they totally guessed right about some of my plot points." It's pretty incredible of you folks :O 

4.) **Did Derek know that Ace was supernatural?**

A: Answered in next chapter, or at most the one after if I end up splitting the chapter again. You know I'm at 155 pages in this story? I realized that some chapters are like 25+ pages long. Sorry about that. ^_^"

5.) **Where the hell is the pack in all of this?**

A: I'm actually comfortable answering this in quite a bit of detail since the rest of them don't really play a big role in this fic. So, yes: Stiles is still considered pack. The rest of them are just living their lives while some pack members have 'moved' out temporarily and are coming back (that's what they believe anyways). 

In my mind, Scott and the others fully expect Stiles and Lydia to come back and that it's just a temporary thing. Although in my universe, Stiles just getting around into the idea of joining the FBI, so he hasn't had that big conversation with Scott about what that would mean in the future for his role within the pack. But Scott isn't really the type of Alpha that will force people to stay, especially since he does believe that some pack members will come back or are still pack despite the distance. At the very least, he has a much more modern and expansive idea of "pack". Like my Scott still thinks of Isaac and Jackson as pack despite being so far away. And I like to think it's the same thing the other way around and that those two even come back (occasionally or more often) from time to time. Also, as much as he hates to admit it, he thinks of Peter as pack too. And Peter does split his time between Beacon Hills and larger cities like San Francisco since he's probably intent on rebuilding the Hale Empire. 'Cause if he can't be the alpha, he might as well get power another way (through money and influence). 

I even had this weird flighty idea that some pack members are off being busy with their own adventures. Like Kira is on a journey to get stronger and Theo decided to try and break into the world of competitive break dancing. Kinda like how Wolverine and some of the other X-Men have their own adventures too. Like "Oh, Wolverine's in that country and got married, I guess? But why wasn't anyone invited? Oh. 'Cause she gets killed in the same issue anyway...". Or like "Jubilee's day out!". 

6.) **Are we going to find out why Derek married Stiles?**

A: Yep. Defo. 

7.) **Are you going to write a sexy spin-off of Derek's sexploits?**

A: So I said that I was considering writing about Derek's sexploits within this story's universe. Confession: ........ I already did. At least I wrote a bunch of scenes.

I wanted to _not_ do it so I can dedicate myself to writing across the plot points I've planned and not be distracted. But I got distracted... I just had a whole bunch of random sexy and pervy scenarios that popped up in my head that I just really wanted to write. So I've written a few. 

IE: Derek and Stiles have a date night at a movie theatre. Stiles is more attentive to the movie than Derek (like insisting on eating the popcorn instead of holding Derek's hand), and Derek gets cruised and fucks in the bathroom to make himself feel better (and guilty for doing it). Or Derek's sexploits in Palm Springs. I've also written quite a bit of that time Derek fucks Ace for the first time in their apartment (and knots him too). I wrote a whole bunch of silly stuff with that that I might change in the end though. Like, Ace shows him this cheesy porn where the plot is a step dad sleeping with the step son and the step son's fiance. And then Derek just casually confesses 'I've done that'. Ha ha ha, yeah... I'm sorry but I'm afraid to say that I did end up getting a bit distracted writing some of those stuff... and is totally not final. I'll probably end up changing a lot of the above 'cause either their too silly, too porny, or just too freaking weird and awkward. >.<"

8.) **Is *insert astute observation on the part of the reader here* going to be explained and was it being mentioned/omitted on purpose?**

A: WOW. Some of those things I literally wrote and thought nobody would notice and a whole lot of ya did. Some of which I was concerned about 'cause I wasn't sure if I wanted to go through with why I might have, say, 'omitted' something. 'Cause I thought I might change my mind about it later (about the why that is), and figured 'well, maybe nobody would have noticed and I can just ninja retcon or ignore it altogether'. Ha ha ha. But then you guys noticed it. So, guess not! Now I have to go through with my initial plan even if I might not like it later. Mainly 'cause I can't think of a way to spin it any other way now. LOL. 

Mhm... is it an appropriate Q&A answer if it's too vague? Was that too vague? Ok. I'll give you an example. The sex club orgy and me not describing Derek's thigh tattoo was omitted on purpose. I did write that description, but decided to remove it when I realized omitting it would work better with one of the bigger plot reveals I'd be doing later. Well, that plot reveal has already been done (ish). So it'll come up in the next few chapters depending on how I'll be breaking these chapters up. The next chapter's action sequence is kicking my butt. 

9.) **Do the concept of Mates matter in this fic's universe?**

A: Definitely. Quite a big deal actually. 

10.) **What does it mean then? How serious is it?**

A: Very serious. Since it's a pretty big plot point that I touch on later, you'll have to wait until that chapter is posted. Sorry. 

And, actually... yeah, so... characters being on the precipice of talking more about it in detail before getting sidetracked is something I'm doing on purpose. I'm probably in the minority for liking how they do that stupid bit in these kinds of shows. You know, the kind of thing where you're like "er... if you only talked about it earlier, maybe it could have been avoided?". >:D 

I mean, yeah... TO BE FAIR. One of my plot points/devices/reasons/etc actually does touch on why Stiles didn't read the Mating Manual. The reason why isn't as big an affair or a huge deal as some people are making it out to be. At least, in my mind, it isn't? More like "yeah, of course that happened because of this person - 'cause doing that totally helped them with their own selfishness" or something. Er, this last sentence maybe have been too much of a hint/reveal? I hope not.

11.) **Did you deliberately write this fic in first person past tense?**

A: Yes. Because I'm a masochist probably. Omg. I did it that way as kind of writing exercise. But MAN, being my own beta is tedious sometimes and a part of me is kinda regretting it (which might show since I've failed to do so at MANY points). Although I've said that I don't edit things, that's not completely true. If I catch myself writing in present or future tense while writing, I'll change the sentence immediately. Then a kind of OCD kicks in and I end up going back to the beginning of the chapter and fast reading paragraphs to check them for the same mistakes and change them if I catch them. But some other chapters I'm just so relieved of finishing them, that I just spell/grammar check. EMBARASSINGLY, I've reread a few chapters after I've posted them and CRINGE at some of my mistakes. Like, in the latest chapter I caught a mistake where it's Gavin speaking, but I wrote something like ' "Dialogue here." I said '. And the very next sentence is Stiles talking (like "I replied'), and I'm like O.o cause it's two first person perspectives in a row despite being from two different people .... so I quickly updated that text yesterday. 

Also, I've noticed that I end up mistyping "from" as "form" a lot. It irritates me that I do that so much. >.<

12.) **Where is Beacon Hills in this fic?**

A: Somewhere near Mt. Diablo, 'cause I find that amusing. It's somewhere near Antioch. 

13.) **Can we trust everything that was said in OnlyFans?**

A: I already answered this in another chapter. But no. There were truths, half truths, and right out lies when Jack talked to Stiles. Someone in the comments section also brought up the fantasy aspect of porn. Derek's OF page defo took advantage of that part in many of his posts. I imagined some are just pretty self explanatory. Like a 15 second clip of a close up of Derek riding a dick and getting creampied. That doesn't really need any context. Well, I suppose the context is "two guys fuck and one guy cums inside other guy's ass and the load shoots out as fucked guy slowly gets off the dick".

14.) **Did** **Lydia** **have a premonition about Stiles and Derek before their wedding?**

A: No. Lydia just had strong reservations about the two of them getting married so young. She made the mistake of not voicing her opinions at that time after she saw how excited Stiles was. She does genuinely regret not having done so after finding out about Derek's affair.

15.) **Is there going to be a happy ending?**

A: Er. 

...

...

....

.....

Depends on who you ask? The ending is logical in my head. Dunno how everyone is gonna take it though. I'll say it now. It's not a Disney ending. No 'everyone's forgiven and they all lived happily ever after'. Sorry.

Updated Q&As 1 - Edited after Chapter 14. 

16.) **Does Derek have other Jobs?**

A: Yes. He actually does still work in construction. But he also has done escorting (due to some prodding from other people, like Ace), and even porn. I have some partially written down in Derek's sexcapades. It defo makes him more of an asshole, but I'm really liking writing it. Actually, it's more difficult writing Derek's sexcapades. 'Cause... er... I end up turning myself on too much sometimes with the scenes I write... *cough*. Sorry for the visual. Pretend I didn't say that.

17.) **Does Stiles have a job?**

A: No, he doesn't. He's saved some money he got throughout his teens (monetary gifts and odd jobs). But mostly he's been using student loans and a bunch of scholarships that ran out after a few semesters. Stiles tries to save his money. But with what little he has, he does spend his money on food for him and Derek and to split the monthly cost of the apartment too. But everything else is on Derek. Stiles feels grateful of this actually, cause he loves and needs the internet. So he's happy Derek provided that for him. Except... Derek's been using it too... for obvious reasons. 

18.) **How can Derek fuck other people that's not Stiles?**

A: Hopefully the story as a whole answers this question for you. 

19.) **Is Derek wearing someone else's collar?**

A: Yes. Derek actually often wears a dog-bone collar with his name on it. But behind it is etched: "Property of Ace". But he also has a few other ones with different owners. Namely "Brody" and "Jack", but a few other people as well. Depending on who's playing with him. But he actually have one custom made too that he hasn't used yet, but wants to. It's etched with "Property of Stiles". I actually do have this in my notes, and I'll be writing about it in the sexcapades. But there was really now way for me to have this in this story (from Stiles' perspective) as it stands. For now as you see anyway...

20.) **Is Derek thinking of Stiles' preferences when he makes changes to his look and body?**

A: Yes. Initially he didn't do anything to change himself physically, as he was ashamed of what he was doing. But as time went on and he got away with more and more, he got more brazen with the changes. Some have been a result of carelessness while other were a result of him actually seeing if Stiles notices. But he doesn't (for a reason-ish). Eventually, some of his physical changes were done because it made him feel good that it was making others feel good. 

21.) **What the fuck is the manual? TELL US ABOUT THE FUCKING MANUAL!**

A: Er. Okay. It'll be up in the next few chapters. O.o"

22.) **Is Peter good?**

A: HAH! No. I mean, come on. The better question would be, "is he sincere" about his feelings/affection for Stiles? That would be a yes. 

23.) **Are the Hales rich?**

A: Peter is super rich (this is in cannon). I just fiddle with the why. Like insurance form the Hale fire as well as other stuff. But that's specific to Peter. A sizeable amount was split between Laura and Derek, when it was thought they were the only "living" survivors (and Peter was in a coma). They still inherited a lot of money when they became adults, but it was squandered for a bunch of reasons. Like Derek and Laura weren't good at handling it, while a sizeable amount was also stolen (in my mind, by Meredith). Then he gave a lot to Cora and A LOT to the pack. He kept some, but it isn't enough to live in Oakland comfortably. He made the mistake of thinking that he'd easily be able to find good work to support himself and Stiles and the lifestyles they had both grown accustomed too. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So if you guys have more questions that I can answer without ruining the plot or ruining your awesome bookclub discussions and theorycrafting, ask them below and I'll update this interlude. 
> 
> Also, note that the questions are totally not in any proper order. Yeah... I also hope I inadvertently didn't answer/reveal something that ruined the plot...


	15. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A battle ensues, within and without.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Know that song? "Where is my mind?" I had that in my head writing this. 
> 
> Also, I cut the action sequence down to like three pages. It was an ORDEAL. OMG. But, you know what? I think I'm kind of proud of it. It took me days to write sentences which then end up being useless cause I changed them this weekend. But, I think I did alright. It was very educational. I actually ended up researching a whole bunch of stuff, like terminology and movement logic. So hopefully my little action sequence made sense. I actually think I can do better in the future with action sequences because of this story. 
> 
> So, sorry again about the delay. As a result, this chapter is shorter than the others but I feel like it's packed full of stuff. We're getting really close to the end so I'm updating the chapter numbers accordingly. This is Chapter 14 even if it says "Chapter 15". Cause the previous Chapter ("14") was the Q&A. I don't know how to change that. Lol.

Ace leapt to the side and avoided my punch with ease. In that moment, Lydia quickly rushed forward and aimed a kick at Ace's head with a sharp cry, but the man dodged it effortlessly. For a second another vaguely red silhouette burst from his body as he dodged Lydia's attack. His faced narrowed into a grimace. 

Lydia recovered quickly and whirled her body around on the ground with her leg jutted out, and attempted to sweep Ace off of his feet. She succeeded as Ace fell with a heavy thud, having managed to trip him to the ground. His face grimaced in pain as he smashed onto the hard soil. I quickly tried to take advantage of the man's prone form and leapt over to aim another punch at his chest. He caught my fist with two crossed arms as he steadied himself with one leg and kicked up with the other. In succession he had kicked, hard, at Lydia's stomach with one leg, as she had moved toward our grappled bodies, and pulled hard at my wrist with his hands, causing me to lose balance and fall forward onto my face. He had rolled to his side and sliced his legs up in the air gracefully and bounded to his feet. For a moment, I couldn't help but be impressed and envious of his physical skill. 

As I had struggled to get back up on my feet, Lydia had already landed several blows to Ace's chest. I had noticed that each of her subsequent blows, emphasized by quick, sharp, cries or grunts, caused his red, fox shaped aura to appear. Several times Ace managed to parry Lydia's blows effortlessly, but Lydia suddenly grunted out an odd, quick, shriek that seemingly made the man flinch, if only for a second, and his aura to flash visibly in the air. This seemed to be enough time for Lydia to slowly push Ace back with another flurry of punches and kicks and forced the man into the defensive. 

Ace eventually managed to catch one of Lydia's fists, grip it tight with one hand, and slashed a large arm across the air to backhand my friend across the face with another. There was a sickening crack in the air as Lydia's body flew to the ground in a muddled heap. In that instant, I charged forward again at the man who had hurt my friend.

"Stop!" Ace snarled as his eyes glowed. 

Whether the voices in my head laughed at Lydia's limp body or my feeble attempts to match her physical prowess, I would never know. But regardless, I used the anger and hate in me to propel my body forward, ignoring the ache in my muscles and the burning in my lungs with every breath that I took. 

"No." I replied as evenly as I could manage as we exchanged blows. 

The stark contrast between Lydia's martial abilities and mine emphasized my deep regret at the fact that I had neglected my training for so long. In the back of my mind I heard Chris' and Parrish's disappointed voices, reprimanding me for my irresponsibility. After all of this time, even I could tell that my movements were far more sluggish and undisciplined as they had been before I left Beacon Hills. 

As it stood, Ace either caught or parried most of my blows. I only ever managed to hit him whenever I tried to pour as much of my spark, what I could manage in my condition, into my fist. Despite my increasing fatigue and sore muscles, every successful hit and subsequent pained grunt from Ace urged me to keep going. I tried to turn my movements into a mantra. I just need to make one movement and then another. It had to be quick and mindless and with as much power as I could manage into as many punches as I could give. I aimed to take him down before I drained myself dry. 

"Can you just fucking stop?" Ace snapped with tremendous frustration as I managed to stagger him with a spark laden blow to his kidney followed by a roundhouse kick to the face. It was as much a surprise to me as it seemed to him. I even took the time to remind myself to go back to Beacon Hills one weekend, and ask for a refresher from Parrish. Just in case there would be more supernatural infidelities in my future. 

Little did he know that I had struggled even more to maintain my composure. Especially after that series of movements managed to strain several key muscles in my body. I felt the ligaments and muscles in my arms and legs now strained with every movement. All of my bones seemed to ache, likely as a backlash against my careless use of my spark after a long time of inactivity. My mind was equally getting fatigued, and each attempt to access my spark took longer and required far more effort than it usually did. 

"No." I repeated before diving forward again. The fatigue had narrowed my vision, and the only thing that I could see clearly was whatever was in front of me. I assured myself that it was fine. One step. One punch. One kick. A little bit of that spark that I always had but lately rarely used. Just a little bit of me in that hit. My pain, my memories, my life, concentrated in as many little blows as I could manage and plastered it onto his skin. 

I knew that it wouldn't last long. But I wanted as much opportunity to take the torn pieces of myself, those little bits of pain, and push them all into that smug face. He had had a hand in tearing up my life. He might as well have a taste of the jagged little pieces he had left in his wake. 

He easily parried both of my blows but struggled with the second as I had forced another bit of my spark into my fist. It strained the cartilage and bone underneath the skin, but it had also increased the force of my hit causing Ace to cough out a mouthful of blood. At least I hoped it was his blood. It could just as have been the blood from the perpetually strained cut on my hand. 

I didn't know how much longer I could hold on. I wondered just how much I was willing to hurt myself just to hurt Ace back. The wound on my hand had barely healed and it had likely opened again. I was carelessly using my spark despite the cost of my weakened body. It was a body that I had let lie fallow for so long and, now, forced to fight in a way as if I was still in the peak of my physique. Despite all of the voices and thoughts in my mind egging me on, pushing me forward with my righteous fury, I couldn't help but ask myself; was it worth it to risk my life for revenge? 

_Yes_. A voice whispered in the distance, far more forceful and familiar than the others. 

The reply surprised me enough that I failed to deflect Ace's fist before it connected with my chest, blowing me back. The force of the hit knocked the air out of my lungs and I frantically gasped for breath on the ground. Everything flashed brightly and for a moment I couldn't see anything past the pain. I don't know how long it took me to catch my breath, but by the time I could finally see, Lydia had once again moved to her feet. 

In the periphery of my blurred vision, I saw Lydia running forward once more to exchange rapid blows with Ace and, frankly, managed far better than I had done. If mine had been a desperate and uncoordinated deluge of blows, Lydia and Ace's bout looked more like an elaborate dance riddled with quick, deliberate movements. There were moments where it seemed like Lydia had flown into the air as she delivered cycled kicks against Ace's muscular body. Despite the stark difference in their size, Lydia was clearly able to manage Ace's forceful counters with measured grace. Her eye were intense, ever focused on the man before her. I felt a brief bout of pride and jealousy at her clearly superior martial abilities. 

I struggled to my feet and fought back the nausea that had threatened to take me over. I glanced at the two dancing forms before me, both dodging and exchanging punches and kicks with so much ease. At one point Lydia had managed another solid kick across Ace's jaw before she quickly snapped her leg back around into an inside crescent kick that pushed him back. 

Then, just as she opened her mouth as if she were about to scream, Ace's body blurred for half a second before it vanished and reappeared in front of her, suddenly within striking distance. The flash of movement seemed to have surprised Lydia and she could barely react as Ace aimed a punch right at her throat. She had been unable to dodge the blow, but had managed to move both of her hands against her neck to mitigate the impending strike with both of her palms. As Lydia was blown back once again with sizeable force, Ace's body blurred once more before it completely vanished within a faded, red, fox-shaped silhouette. 

I staggered over to Lydia's prone form and helped her to her knees as she gasped and coughed for breath. She held onto my shoulders as the pain in her throat forced her to vomit out whatever had been in her stomach. Once I knew she had spat everything out, I leaned back to my haunches and pulled her against me. We held each other for a few minutes, trying to find our bearings and our breath. She recovered much faster than I did and tried to speak to me but only managed a barely legible croak.

"Whrac..." She rasped and flinched in pain the moment the sound had escaped her throat. I grew worried at her apparent condition, suddenly all too aware how foolish it had been for me to face Ace mindlessly. I had not only jeopardized my life, but my friend's too. But how could I have know he was a Were? Had Derek known? 

"Did I miss something?" A familiar voice asked and startled both of us to our feet. 

_Yes_. That distant voice whispered eagerly. It had actually sounded much closer and clearer than the other voices that I usually heard in my head.

To my surprise, Deaton was walking towards us from the street, looking nonplussed and curious. 

"What the hell are you doing here?" I asked, more surprised than confused at the Druid's appearance. 

"I shouldn't be. But Peter insisted. Or should I say, threatened? He even charted a private plane for me in Seattle." He replied as he turned his attention to Lydia's injured form. "Are you alright Ms. Martin? Why are _you_ here?"

Lydia tried to respond but only managed another croak. Deaton approached her after that garbled response and studied her throat. 

"What were you doing in Seattle? And why would Peter call you- no, you know what? It's fine. It's good actually. Very good." I rambled as my mind focused on new avenues of thought, and they all centered around Ace's true form. 

"It is?" Deaton asked curiously, but his tone seemed vaguely wary. 

"Yes. I think it's all his fault. It must be. He must have used some fucked up Were magic, you know?" I rambled. "That's why Derek fucked around. That's why I was so fucking blind, right? It has to be."

"I'm sorry. What Were? And Derek did what while you were what?" Deaton asked with confusion.

"That fox Were. I saw- _We_ saw his fucking aura. It was just like Kira's but gross and red. Which makes fucking sense. Right Lydia?" I replied, turning to Lydia for confirmation. But all she managed was another croak from her bruised throat. "She kicked ass and he punched her in the throat. That's why she can't talk. You're here now so you can help her out. I have a kit in the apartment you can use." 

I rambled before marching towards the building lobby, not even bothering to check if they had followed me. By the time the elevator car had arrived, they had managed to catch up.

"Mr. Stilinski, wait. Stop. Can you please take the time to explain the situation? Is Peter here? Why did he ask me to come here instead of meeting him?" He asked.

"Sorry Doc, no time to talk." I replied as the elevator doors opened. I ushered Deaton inside as I helped Lydia onto the elevator. "We have a fox to hunt."

"Exactly what floor are we heading to?" He asked as he watched the slow turn of the elevator counter move from M to 2. 

"24." I muttered as the 2 slowly changed to 3 after almost half a minute of moving. I had forgotten how slow the elevator moved... It frustratingly took some of the steam off from my rather dramatic proclamation. If my life had been a TV show, the scene would just cut out and transition to the next dramatic act. Instead, the three of us awkwardly watched as the number slowly changed to 4. 

"I think we have time." He replied kindly as Lydia rolled her eyes. 

For the second time that day, I relayed my shame. Far more truncated and with less detail than I had told Peter, but enough to emphasize my theories. And to say they were plentiful was an understatement. I was suddenly overcome with a clarity. No, it wasn't a clarity as much as deluge of new ideas. New avenues of thought. These were paths that had been offered to me by my brilliant mind. All the voices agreed. 

"I thought I was just being willfully blind or whatever, but that has to be it right?" I pressed as we moved past the 18th floor after my story. "I mean, how could I not see so many things that were right in front of me? I mean, Derek's new stuff, his new tattoo, his piercing? All that ignorance couldn't have been me right, it has to have been Ace!" 

"I'm sorry, Stiles, but how did you make that out?" Deaton asked, confused. 

"He blurred while we fought him. He made himself fucking disappear!" I replied excitedly. "He can do that then he can do the other things too. I betcha he fucked with Derek's brain, right? Like he fucked with mine. To make me not see! That has to be it." 

"I'm sorry, but what you've said isn't very informative. You need to tell me more. I can't help if I can't understand." He said as we moved past the 20th floor. 

I shook my head clear of Deaton's words and clutched the words that repeated itself in my mind, that I could feel in my heart, that etched the truth of it in my soul. It had all been because of Ace. Derek and I had been happy before Ace. We had a healthy marriage before he had appeared. He had taken all that happiness and all the joy away from what would have been a hard, but good marriage. We could have moved past all of the pain and the loneliness if he had not been there. Derek and I could have talked if he hadn't been there to take Derek's time. I would have spared more time for Derek if I didn't think it was alright for Derek to spend time with his 'friend' instead. I would have made more time. It was all because of him. 

After all, most everything wrong in my life could be explained by the supernatural. Why not the mistakes of my marriage? They weren't my own. They probably weren't even Derek's. They were his. If it had not been for him, Derek would have worked harder for us. I would have worked harder for us. We could have worked harder together and we would have been happier for it. Derek would only need me. Only me. Not Ace. Not his fans. 

_Yes_.

"Stiles!" Deaton's voice broke through the heady thoughts that filled my mind, and the flurry of voices that spoke with unison, echoing that single, familiar... thing. 

I scrambled out of the elevator and ran down the hallway and straight through my apartment doors. I barely had time register Derek's form as well as two others in the apartment. 

"Stiles? What are you doing here?" Derek asked with surprise as I burst through the door. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_? 

I ignored the question as I marched straight to the bedroom. The place was a mess and it stank of sex. It was a familiar musk that clearly had been the result of men's, sweaty, heaving bodies. Had this always been there? Was this what our den always smelled like? Had my absence been long enough to reset my sense of smell, suddenly forgetting what the combined musk of our mated space smelled like? 

Or perhaps it had been something else? There were unfamiliar clothes on the bed, including a soiled jockstrap. There were a few cameras on stands that were positioned around our bed. There were even handcuffs on the bedposts. 

But this wasn't the time to think much of it. Was it? 

_No_. 

I need to move forward. I needed weapons. I needed to get through this. I was right. I was righteous. I could fix it all. I could put all the pieces back together. It would all be alright. 

I moved down to the floor and crawled around underneath the bed and grabbed the large, black, case I had kept underneath. I pulled it out from under the bed and flipped open the case expecting to find it full of weapons we had packed from Beacon Hills. Chris, Parrish, and even Noshiko had given us weapons as wedding and goodbye presents. I had filled this case full of sharp, variedly painful things. I was instead greeted by an empty case. 

Anger flooded my head as a rush of profanities slipped through my lips as the voices in my head roared with mocking laughter. One particular laugh was far more sinister than the others. But it quickly left my thoughts, supplanted by the building anger. 

"Where the fuck are they?" I screamed as I marched back out into the living room. "Where did you fucking put my weapons?"

"I don't know." Derek replied stiffly. "I didn't take your weapons." 

"Really? What? So the my guns and my crossbow just came to life one night and walked out that fucking door? Where did you hide my fucking weapons, Derek?" I seethed as I clenched my fists tightly. 

Behind him stood Peter and my father. My heart clenched at the sight and I felt liquid on my wounded hand. I didn't bother to check to know that I had split the wound open again. But I no longer minded. I had been split open too many times already that morning. I was torn and full of open wounds, not all of which could be seen. What was another one in the grand scheme of things?

The sight of them suddenly pushed my purpose from my mind. Suddenly, I could not longer remember what I had needed the weapons for. Ace, right? I hated him. I needed to hunt him down. I needed to break him and makes things better. Killing him would fix things. But all the broken things in my life were currently in this room, looking at me with sad eyes. 

The pity just made me angrier. It was unwarranted. It was unnecessary. Especially from them. Of all the people in the world, I didn't need pity from them. 

"Son, you've got to calm down. It's alright if you've misplaced..." My dad began to say but I had quickly interrupted his train of thought, as Peter stood not far from him in silence. 

"Don't you fucking dare say I lost my own fucking guns. Don't let that be the first thing that comes out of your mouth after so long. After I found out you've been fucking my husband." I rambled, trying to keep the anger tamped down inside my chest, trying to grasp at the brief but solid purpose from before. It had been there, hadn't it? I wondered if it had been real. To my relief, the voices agreed with me. They egged me on, pushing my anger to the surface and reassured me of my righteousness. Was it the same purpose? Maybe not. But at least it was a purpose and it was righteous. "You don't get to have an opinion right now. Because as much as I love you, all I want to do right now is kill you. So don't fucking give me another reason to want to." 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_? 

"Stiles..." Lydia croaked at my words, shock painted her face as she walked through the front door. My father looked both surprised and pained by my words. He had shut his eyes and grimaced at the declaration. 

The hurt and surprise made me even angrier. Another reaction that was enough to distract me from the clarity I had before. What had it been? It existed, I knew it. 

"You don't get to look at me like that." I snapped at Lydia as I scrambled to remember my purpose. I had fought, hadn't I? I had been hurt, hadn't I? They admitted it. They did not deny it. My pain had been real. Was real. It was there. I never wanted it. It had been theirs to give. It was mine to reluctantly take. "They're the ones who've turned my whole fucking life upside down. For what? A good fuck? It was all that goddamn fucking mutant son-of-a-bitch, isn't it?"

"Stiles, what happened? Why are you and Lydia bleeding? And why does Lydia sound like a frog?" Peter inquired. "Deaton, you're late." 

"Stiles, calm down." Derek said slowly, his hands motioned in the air in a placating manner. "Before you'll say something you'll regret."

"Derek, that's not helping." I heard Deaton say tiredly. 

"Calm down? You're telling me to fucking calm down? After _everything_ that you've done, you're telling me to 'calm down' and that I'll regret something?" I asked evenly as the voices in my head laughed heartily. I watched Peter moved towards Lydia, his eyes studied her bruised throat before turning back and motioned Deaton towards her and asked him something I couldn't hear. But I could see Peter cup her neck with a hand and watched as thin, black, lines began travelling into his fingertips and up his arm. Unlike Scott's reaction the first time I had seen him do it, Peter showed no overt reaction at taking someone else's pain. I found that rather curious at that time. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_? I shook my head at the question and worked to gather my wits about me.

"After you've fucked my father and half of the damn city. After your fucking boyfriend just tried to kill us?" I snapped angrily, glowering at my fool of a mate. "Did you know? Did you fucking know what he was?" 

"What?" Derek asked, confused. "What are you talking about?"

_What did the Tree say to Fall_?

"Who? Ace?" Peter asked with narrowed eyes. 

"Looks like your fuck buddy is more than just a monster in between the sheets." I replied dryly as I again tried to shake all of the questions from my mind. "Or did you always know? Was that another thing that you were hiding, huh? Well Ace just tried to fucking kill us and almost crushed Lydia's throat." 

"So, he was a Were. Well, it's nice to be proven right again." Peter said smugly, a wide smile plastered on his face. 

"No, that's not..." Derek insisted and shook his head with my words. He turned to Lydia, his face silently pleaded a denial. But his expression quickly shifted into one of dismay when Lydia nodded in confirmation as Peter removed his hand from her throat. Deaton took his place and carefully touched and studied her faintly bruised throat. "No. He wouldn't... this is all so fucking wrong. You must have done something! He would never have..."

" _I_ did something?" I screamed. " _I_ did something?"

"That's not... I don't understand. Why would he do that?" My dad asked quietly, his hands tightly clenched at his sides. 

"Derek. John. Shut up." Peter said evenly as his gaze studied me. 

"It wasn't me!" A voice interrupted as Ace's form appeared from within the blur of a red, fox-shaped silhouette from across the room.

"You son-of-a-bitch!" I yelled and immediately ran towards his hunched over and pained form. But before I could even move a few feet away, Peter reached forward and grabbed my arms to hold me back. "Let me go!" 

"Stiles. Stop. You're losing control. You don't have to do this alone." Peter replied seriously as he turned me around to look deep into my eyes. "You _have_ to stay in control."

"After everything that he's done..." I said as my hands shook with tremendous rage. 

"Stiles, what's happening?" Deaton asked while he cupped Lydia's throat with his hand, something brown and wooden in between them. In the dresser beside him stood open one of my emergency kits. A stray thought wondered how Deaton had found it. Lydia had her eyes shut tight and grimaced as I felt the trickling of a force move from the Druid, past the piece of broken wood and to Lydia's throat. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_? The voice asked eagerly this time. 

"Look, I didn't do anything to Derek. He _chose_ me. You can't blame me for your shitty marriage." Ace sneered from a distance, which earned a particularly loud and nasty, wolf-faced snarl from Peter. Ace's face snapped into a surprise, jumping back at Peter's sudden transformation. 

"Stiles, listen to _my_ voice..." Deaton said. 

I shook my head to clear it of the voices. 

"It's still my fault?" 

"Yes!" Ace snapped despite Peter's growl. If it had not been for the older man's grip holding me in place, I would have dived in again. But very briefly, I felt Peter's grip slacken and noticed his body suddenly seemed poised towards Ace's direction. "They made all of the fucking decisions. I may have made things harder to notice, but he's the one who refused to see! Derek could stop anytime he wants, but he chose to play with _me_!" 

"Stiles..." I heard Lydia croak from somewhere behind me. 

"You fucking asshole." I snapped at Derek. "That's who you've left me for? I'm supposed to be your _mate_. It meant something me. But I guess it meant fuck all to you."

"It means _nothing_ to you." Ace replied icily, earning another angry growl from Peter, who he easily ignored. "Derek said as much to me too." 

"No. That's not what I meant!" Derek cried out as he once again shook his head. "Stop putting words in my mouth. Give me the chance to explain!" 

"Stiles, we need to talk. Please, son. I can explain." My dad interrupted, his eyes pained and red from... something. I wondered if that pain had been honest. The Voices in my head mocked it in laughter. 

"My nephew's an idiot, Stiles. You know that. And clearly, so is your father." Peter replied evenly, as he obviously worked hard to tamp down on the anger that had been etched on his face. "The two of you would do well to shut. Up. Now."

"He's mine!" I snapped mindlessly at Ace. They were words that I regretted immediately after they had been said. Through all of it as a small part of me, ever shrinking then, flinched at the absurdity of the situation. For a moment, a brief flash of Scott and me mocking this exact situation playing out on Daytime TV crossed my mind. When had I become this person? Who was I? Scott and I would have laughed at this. Overly dramatic and ridiculous. Back then, we had laughed at the surreality of it all. But now, embarrassingly, I was a victim of it. 

"The hell he is. You couldn't even fucking make the time for him, let alone his knot." He sneered. "At least John and I could take it. What the hell do you give him?" 

"Shut up!" Peter roared with glowing eyes. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_? 

"Stiles, please. Derek, Ace, stop. We all just need to calm down and talk..." My dad pleaded, his voice sounded strained and broken. Was he unable to sound anything but? His pathetic attempts to try and establish some peace angered me further more than anything. 

"Yes. We all just need to stop and take a breath. Stiles, what's in your mind?" Deaton asked and I recognized a trace of worry that had seeped into his voice. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_? 

"What am I thinking? You're wondering what I'm thinking?" I scoffed. "I'm thinking 'what possessed my own father to fuck my husband the night before my wedding day'. I'm thinking, 'how could he fuck around with his own son's husband'. Why? Why did you do that?"

The latter had sounded more worn and tired than what I had expected it to be. I had meant to say them angrily. But looking at my father's face flinch at every word sent prickling needles into my heart. Not because the words had been asked. Not because they had needed to be asked. The prickling came about because despite what I had expected, seeing my words cause him pain made me feel good. It was this pleasure that pricked my heart. 

"It's not that simple. We tried not to, but we couldn't." He said pleadingly, his eyes scrunched up in that way when he was in pain. "Stiles, I love him." 

"Excuse me?" I asked angrily. 

"I love him, son. I haven't felt this way since..." He began, but his words cut out as he mouthed them in the air. He took a moment to take a deep breath before he continued. "I haven't felt this way since your mother." 

His words shook my heart. Other things shook, I think. I couldn't quite tell. I think, for a moment, I saw all of them steady themselves as if something had shaken them too. Was it my heart that shook, or this room? I wondered. It must've have been my mind. Only my mind. It shook because it was my heart that was breaking. The room still seemed fine. 

"Was that an earthquake?" I vaguely heard Ace ask distantly. But I no longer paid any mind to that creature. Not me anyways. That intense desire within me wasn't mine. Many things were no longer mine it seems. What was left behind for me? 

"Oh, fuck." Peter muttered as he laid his eyes on John. "Shit. So that's what that's about. Stiles it's..."

"I hate you." I said quietly. I barely felt the tears roll down my cheeks. As I clenched my hand and my muscles stiffened, my heart and my mind pounded and shook with rage. It was a rage fuelled by unimaginable pain. I could no longer articulate it with words. My world shook with relentless tremors and I fought to stay conscious and... myself. 

They all looked surprised again as my world shook around me. They all looked around too, looking about them. They all suddenly looked worried and confused. Could they feel it too? Could they feel what little of my existence was breaking down into something else? Could they feel what was left of the world that I had built crumbling before me?

"No, Stiles. Stop. You have to listen!" Peter desperately rambled as he shook me in his arms. Maybe that's why my world was shaking after all. Wasn't it? I wondered if that's why the others shook too. Maybe it was the reality falling into pieces all around us after all. We were all blind but we would soon see. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_?

"All of you. Just liars and killers." I muttered quietly. 

"It's not a lie!" Derek snapped at my words. "Look, we shouldn't do this right now. Something's wrong. Something's happening." 

"Clearly." Deaton's worried voice replied. "Mr. Stilinski, if you would please look into my eyes and listen to my voice."

"What, so you can just lie to me again? So he can blame me again? It's always me, isn't it? Never him! Or maybe you want to kill me too?" I replied with a crescendo until I had screamed that last part angrily. 

"What? Stiles, what are you..." Peter began to say, confused but was suddenly lost in thought as he stared deeper in my eyes. 

"Stiles..." Lydia said with a raspy voice. It had sounded better than it had been before, but her face looked worried and afraid. She seemed to be staring, not entirely past me, but around me. Her hands trembled as she slowly tried to reach forward. I supposed she had been drawn by my grief. Deaton snapped his gaze towards her before he turned back to study me once again. 

"It's always fucking me, isn't it? Me. It's fucking my fault. It's me. It's fucking me." I repeated as I began to pound my head with my fists as that damn question repeated in my head. Peter tried to hold me down tighter, moving to grip my wrists in his hands. But he failed. My anger and grief was stronger than any Were could stopper. It was there, in my head. All those angry little things. That angry little thing. That righteous, angry thing. It was there. It just needed to get out. I needed it to be right. I needed it to make everything right, right? 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_? 

"Stiles, stop!" My dad pleaded once again as his arms reached for me as I continued to pound on my head with my fists. I vaguely felt Peter's hands tighten on my wrists as he seemed to worked harder in keeping them steady, to no avail. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_?

"Stiles, you need to stop." Peter said in a panicked voice as he struggled to hold down my arms. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_?

"What is that?" I heard Ace ask in the distance. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_?

"Stiles, no!" I heard Lydia's raspy voice call out before it had been drowned out by that damn voice and that damn question once again. She reached out and touched the rim of it. I felt her as she felt the shape of it. Her cry had given it shape. Her words had given it form as my grief gave it substance. 

_What did the Tree say to Fall_?

"Leaf me alone!" I screamed in response to the darkness in my mind. I hated that damn pun. It wasn't funny. But the voice only laughed. Then there was nothing but a single reply from a low, silky, familiar voice. 

The voice was no longer in my mind. It was beside me. 

"No." It said calmly.

Then there really was nothing. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll also be updating the Q&A after this with some questions that came up. So take a look at that if you want (it's "Chapter 14" but not really). 
> 
> Again, I only edited this one time once it was fully completed. Hopefully I removed the appropriate sections I had deleted/changed in the process of writing, otherwise it'll really screw up the flow of the story. Ugh. I'll read it again tomorrow to see if I missed stuff (and I usually do). >.<
> 
> Also, I may have updated the max chapter count to 18, but that could increase or decrease depending on how I write the next few chapters. As well as whether or not I add an epilogue.


	16. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles lives in memories for a moment, looking for an axis to the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay. So I'm sorry but I'm going to change the chapter count. I'm pushing it up. Mainly 'cause I got the idea to incorporate some things I've written for that promised Derek's Sexcapades and put some parts of them in this chapter instead. If somehow I end up not posting those, I at least have some of it here. This means this pushed some scenes in other chapters. This chapter now actually ends about 2/3rd of the previous chapter I would have posted. But I'm adding stuff onto the chapter too (sexy stuff). They might be unnecessary at this point, but hey, I think they still answer some questions while giving me an excuse to be a bit more gratuitously pervy. 
> 
> So sorry, there's a chance I'm going to keep changing the chapter cap. But it's there to just let you know that we are indeed close to the end (and that, hopefully, I'll end up answering all of your questions. Even if it's chapter by chapter at this point). 
> 
> Also, I totally didn't have time to edit this. Basically, you guys are my Betas at this point. I'm embarrassed to push this out without editing... but here it is. Please let me know if there's some nonsensical edits and sections that you come across. They might be a result from my adding and changing stuff to this chapter. Thank you for your understanding and your continued patronage!
> 
> **EDIT: Read the early comments and realized that I did in fact forget to move something. Yes, he's at Anastasia's place in this chapter, having moved himself and two unconscious bodies. I added the paragraph. Sorry about the confusion.

"What are you doing?" Derek chuckled as I fidgeted under the covers. 

"Don't move, my toes are cold." I grumbled, trying to insert my cold toes between warm, thick, trunk-like legs. 

"Ah, fuck!" He hissed for a second before poking me at my sides. "Why are your toes so cold?"

"Shhh, adorable space heaters don't talk." I mumbled as I nestled deeper into his arms. "They hum sometimes."

"You mean, like this?" Derek teased playfully before pulling me tighter against his body and growled lowly, his chest rumbling to life. 

"Mhm, yes." I replied contentedly, nestling my face in between his large pecs. "Rumble, rumble, rumble..."

"You know you could actually _try_ rumbling, instead of saying the word." Derek pointed out while fiddling with my left earlobe. 

"Nah, it's better this way. Like: Snuggle." I replied as I snuggled deeper into his arms. 

"I'm not complaining. Although, you _did_ snuggle closer just now." He chuckled. "I'm just saying that doing things instead of saying the word has definite benefits. Like 'raspberries'." 

"Raspberries?" I asked contentedly with a sigh.

"Raspberries!" Derek suddenly exclaimed before he quickly moved down to bury his face in my belly and blew hard as he tickled my sides.

"What? No! Stop!" I laughed, my body wracked with delight, and I playfully slapped his well muscled arms.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" Derek proclaimed grandly as he fingered my bellybutton. 

"What? What're you doing?" I asked confused, while I giggled at the sensation of Derek fingering my bellybutton.

"Treasure!" Derek announced, showcasing a rather sizeable bellybutton lint ball in between his fingers. 

"No!" I whimpered, reaching for the thing with my hands as Derek kept it away with a playful smirk.

"Sorry, finders keepers. It's mine now." Derek said seriously before shoving the ball into his own bellybutton. "It's gone forever." 

"Well, I guess I have to go on an expedition!" I declared, suddenly jumping onto his body, pushing his muscular frame on the bed. He laughed easily at my reaction and laughed much louder, and freer, the moment I started searching for my ball of fluff in his belly button with my lips and my tongue. It surprisingly took me a long time to find it.

Then there was a blinding, disorienting flash. Suddenly, I looked out of eyes without the ability to move a muscle. But I knew these were my own eyes and I was in my own body. I was walking down a vaguely recognizable room, but it was not of my own free will. I dragged two familiar bodies into an empty room filled with folding chairs and an unkempt hide-a-bed. To my left was the unconscious and bloody body of the asshole Ace, and to my right was Deaton's similarly unconscious form. 

I looked about me as best as I could without the ability to move my own head. I was surprised to find myself back at Anastasia's place and what had been my temporary shelter. The room was empty, save myself and the two unconscious bodies before me. My hide-a-bed was still just as unkempt as I had left it that morning. Bright light shone through the curtained windows, and there was an eerie quiet upon the place save for the clamouring voices in my head. One of the thoughts were my own, from my own musings and not the Voices, wondering how I had come to this place, let alone dragging two unconscious bodies. But before I could wonder anymore about it all, I fell through that cold, place once more. 

There was another flash and I found myself standing in a cold and stifling darkness. The darkness flickered for a moment, oddly, before it oozed and shifted like a thick, dense, liquid into my childhood bedroom in Beacon Hills. I stood in the middle of this familiar face that felt oddly alien. Each object seemed an exact replica of things in my memories, but somehow felt empty and without substance. I stood at the far end of the room and was facing my reflection in a full length mirror that I never had. 

"Doesn't matter." My reflection replied to my surprise. 

It was a familiar reflection, but not only because it bore my voice and my face. It felt familiar in a dreadful, and sad, way. 

"We would." My reflection replied dryly, as if it could read my mind. "We can, you idiot." 

"Oh." I replied as I suddenly realized the truth of things. 

"Yes." my reflection replied.

"We're in my head." I said out loud. "But there's no..."

My reflection then pointed to his left and my gaze moved towards the direction to find two wrestling giant pandas as Jackson, dressed, and acting like a WWE ring girl, moved around the two beautiful animals, waving a round card above his head. 

"Ah, there it is." I nodded to myself, easily convinced that we were indeed in my mind. I was suddenly all too self conscious at the knowledge that my reflection would, logically, know everything that I was thinking as a result. 

"Not really. _You_ don't even know what you mean sometimes. If you don't know, _We_ don't know, unless it is something We do. I do know more than you. Although," he pointed out before glancing at Jackson's scantily clad, in tight short-shorts and crop-top, form jump up and down excitedly as one of the giant pandas clotheslined the other. "We have no idea what that is." 

"It's two pandas wrestling." I explained the obvious. "And Jackson's the ring ho." 

"Right..." My reflection drawled with narrowed eyes. "We don't have much time, even if we have as much as we might need in this mind of yours." 

"Ugh, what?" I asked, confused. "If I'm confused, wouldn't you be confused?"

"No." He replied evenly. 

"Because you're something else." I pointed out, my mind suddenly flashing to all of the creatures I had studied in the bestiary, online, and Deaton's secret stash of books. "But still me?"

"Yes." He replied. 

"But not really. You seem really familiar." I said slowly, trying to put a name to the familiar feeling. I looked to the right where the wrestling pandas should have been, but instead I found the gaunt, pale-faced figure of my void-self; that Nogitsune clone that shattered into dust. I turned away and stared back at the mirror. "But not really."

"Yes. You called for us." The image explained. 

I looked to my right once more and found the clone had gone, instead I saw another version of myself. I watched myself shift and age, and quickly turned into a torn, scarred, image of a broken, desperate, and angry man. I was dressed in a dark cloak, while my face was permanently set in a snarl. It was the face of a Dark Oak. It was Julia's last face as much as it could be still be mine. A light around the figure shifted, and for a moment, it changed into my void-self, before it changed back into the form of an angry, broken, Druid. Both figures held strong, intense, and desperate eyes. They were powerful, admirable, eyes even if the faces they rested upon left very little to desire. 

"We need an Axis." The reflection explained, pulling my attention back to the mirror, as an image of Ace flashed through my mind. "One of his." 

"No." I replied with a hard shake of my head, quickly realizing what he wanted it for. 

"That was a yes." He replied, seeing through my words. I suppose that was simple enough, as my reasoning would have crossed his mind, er-our mind, too. 

"Exactly." He agreed. 

"I..." I stammered as I realized the futility of articulating any form of denial. 

The truth of the matter was that the longer I stood there in, wherever, the further away from the pleasant memory with Derek I got, and the clearer the miserable recent memories became. 

"What happened to the boy who cried out for pain, strife, and despair on those who have wronged him?" The strongest Voice asked, so expertly mimicking my own. It shifted the reflection in the mirror into something slightly different. It's image straddled the line between the two nightmares that I had just witnessed. "Life is a nightmare. We will give you sweet dreams rooted in good memories until blood justice is achieved." 

"I don't want that anymore." I insisted as quick flashes of the recent days blinded my vision. 

"You lie." The Voice hissed. 

"I don't want that from you. I can do it with my own hands." I hedged as I worked to shut down the visions that played before me. 

"Our hands are your hands. Our face is your face. You can't tear the shadow away from the body." The Voice replied stoically. "We do not seek permission. We already have it. But we do wish you'd be more... comfortable."

I woke up running in the woods. It was dark and relatively quiet. Only my panting breath, my footsteps, and the crackle of snapping twigs filled the empty night. But there was no fear in me. There was only an earnest joy. I laughed into the night, ignoring the uncomfortable dress pants and suit that I wore, totally unsuited for the chase. I could hear fast moving footfalls behind me, and I knew that he was coming near. I rounded the bend of a large tree, and used the trunk of it to help propel me further forward. I ducked down low hanging branches and burst through bushes, but the footfalls behind me came ever closer. The footfalls carried with it an eager chuckle that I barely heard past the drumming of my heart that filled my ears. 

Then, suddenly, I was swept off my feet. For a moment I was swung around in midair, carried between two, strong, well muscled arms. The world rushed around me as my heart swelled with joy and pride. I looked up at the man who had carried me off into his arms, pressed against the body of the Wolf, my mate, who had caught me. 

" _Mine_." He had said, his eyes glowing blue in the moonlight, before sinking his teeth on my skin to mark me as such. 

Another flash of light blinded my vision and once again I became a passenger in my own body. I approached Ace's still form slowly before squatting down in front of his unconscious body. But just as the Voices were about to reach for Ace's unconscious body, Deaton stirred with a gasp, his eyes flashed open and stared at my crouching form.

"What..." the druid began to say, but before he could complete the sentence, the Voices spoke as one. 

"ᛋᛚᛖᛖᛈ." They commanded absentmindedly, causing the elderly druid to fall into a deep sleep once more. 

A part of me felt a pang of regret after witnessing the act, but most of me were eager to do what they felt needed to be done. The Voices took hold of Ace's left hand just as they put another hand atop the sleeping Were's mouth. 

"ᚨᚹᚨᚲᛖᚾ." The Voices spoke as one and Ace's eyes flashed open, wide and fearful with a golden hue, and stared directly into my own. My hand muffled his screams as I began crushing his fist. 

His Were nails lengthened defensively into claws at the threat, and he tried to struggle for a moment but eventually was unable to escape from the Voices grasp. Their intent having been a rousing success, they no longer needed the Were's consciousness and promptly punched him, hard, square in the face, and knocked Ace back into unconsciousness. I watched on with shock as the Voices slowly, and methodically, pulled all the lengthened claws from Ace's left hand, the skin stretching, tearing, and bleeding with every action, and slowly began attaching it onto my own. Although I could not feel the act, I flinched at the sight of my own hands shoving someone's claws underneath own fingernails. 

_What are you doing_? I asked and promptly found that like everything else, I no longer had control of my own voice. 

"You'll see." The Voices spoke with my mouth, a perfect imitation of my own voice. Then with no further preamble, the Voices shoved all five sharp, jagged, nails into Ace's neck. 

The world flashed once more until I, once again, found myself looking out of a pair of eyes in a body I could not control. Three of us sat in a brightly lit living room, the world outside invisible within the darkness of night. 

Stiles was laughing hard. Harder than I had seem him laugh for some time. Derek smiled warmly at the happy sight and I smiled at seeing him smile. Stiles threw an arm around me, trying to steady himself from his raucous laughter, happily joking around like we were good friends. Derek looked and smelled pleased at the sight of it and, surprisingly, aroused. I couldn't help but react from the scent with a burst of my own arousal, and I saw Derek steal a quick glance in my direction. No doubt he had thought I had grown aroused from Stiles' physical contact. Most of the time it didn't even matter that that I controlled my libido, considering that the two of us were almost always surrounded by horny men at the site. Those burst of arousal could be brushed off as having been caused by many other things, let alone due to Derek himself. 

The truth of it was that I had hoped that I would get along with Stiles before I had even met him, knowing full well what he meant to Derek. Although I thought that Stiles was, and is, oblivious to Derek's desire for the two of us to get along. Most of the time Stiles would be friendly with me whenever I came over. But it always seemed perfunctory or through some awkward distance. He would almost always eventually find an excuse to leave the room or pass on any opportunity to spend time with me and his husband outside. It was either more homework, games that he wanted to catch up on and play by himself, TV shows that he _just_ had to watch, or that he was too tired to do anything that we wanted to do. So it was a good change of pace to find him joking around with us, even if it was just for a little while. 

"Alright, well I'm already way too tipsy and exhausted. So I'm going to hit the sack." He announced after finishing his glass of wine that I had brought. 

"Are you sure? We could still watch a movie?" Derek asked, wanting him to stay. 

"Nah, you guys go ahead. I'm too tired. It was nice talking to you, man." Stiles said with a smile, putting a hand forward to my surprise, but I quickly took it in my own hands and shook it. With a final wave, he heads off to their den, their bedroom, and closes the door. 

"Well, that lasted longer than usual." I laughed before moving over to the couch, settling directly next to Derek. 

He lays a hand on the bare skin of my leg, just below the hemline of my shorts before smiling at me softly and asked, "what do you want to do now?"

I quickly grew hard at the touch, and the room was suddenly filled with more musk of my arousal. This time I knew he could smell it and that he knew it was from me _for_ him. To my pleasure, I smelled his own arousal starting to fill the room. It was a heady musk, a mixture of gym sweat, pine, and something slightly floral. 

He coughed awkwardly and pointed at the wall mounted TV. "Movie?"

"Sure! There's a movie that I want to watch with you." I announced, before pulling a USB drive out of my pocket. After months of laying down the foundations of Derek's seduction, the crux of my plan was about to be done tonight. Although I was confident in my abilities, a part of me still wondered if Derek would take the bait. He just seemed to stubbornly dedicated to Stiles, and I couldn't understand why. I felt he and I were more compatible than that scrawny human. Maybe it would have been easier to reveal my second nature after all? 

"I have Netflix and Amazon on my TV." He pointed out.

"Don't lose us." The Voices announced, stopping the scene and pulling me out of Ace's memories. "You shouldn't have left the memory." 

_Well_ , _I don't even fucking know how I did it_. I griped, all too thankful from the sheer fact of no longer being Ace in his memories. _How the hell did that happen_? _This_... _shouldn't be possible_. _Ace isn't an Alpha_. _How did you do that with his claws_? 

"Your knowledge and skill are limited." It replied calmly. "We are everyone and everything that has created us, including you. All creation merely requires a will, and a spark."

_What are you looking for_? I asked, dreading the answer that I already knew.

"You know what it is. We've said it." Then the Voices smiled. "You agree." 

_An Axis Mundi_. 

"Like the eyes of a raven, the tongue of a snake, or..." The Voices began to recite.

_The claws of a wolf_. _A Were_. I completed. _Things where knowledge can be achieved_. 

"And so many more." It replied. 

_You want his tails_. I pointed out, articulating one of the desires that had been whispered to me these past few days. 

" _You_ want his tails. We need the strongest one. There are likely two." He explained. 

_For your revenge_. 

"For yours. We are your will, but we need the Axis to manifest in full. You are lacking." They replied. "Time passes slowly as it passes quickly. There is much time but so very few to spare before they come. We need the memory. Behave and do not lose yourself."

_I'm not going to sleep in that lie_! I growled, my voice booming within our minds, as I refused the happy memories. 

With a raised eyebrow, the Voices shrugged. "Your choice. Unnecessary for us. Then help us find it."

_Where_? _What would that even look like_? _They literally can be anything_. I griped. Considering that I knew next to nothing substantial about Ace, I wondered how I would even recognize his tails. 

"We are close. It was related to that memory you had lived. But it may have been too far. Focus and bring Us closer." It said before it faded into darkness. 

"I have Netflix and Amazon on my TV." Derek pointed out, pulling me out of my reverie. 

"This is way better. Come on! I know you'll like it. It's hot and hilarious." I said teasingly with a wide, toothy smile. I used my most adorable smile, as described by my exes, practically vibrating on my seat with excitement. 

I quickly move to attach the USB on a TV slot before running back to grab the remote from his hands. Searching for the file on the drive, I quickly played the movie before he even had the chance to read what the title was. But a few minutes into the film, I knew he could already tell what it was.

"Is this porn?" He asked, turning to me with a quizzically raised eyebrow. 

I just laughed in response. I corrected him with, "it's porn with plot."

"We're not watching porn, Ace." He replied tiredly, shaking his head in amusement. 

I grabbed his shoulders and tried to shake his firm, muscular, body, to no avail. It was one of the things I admired about him. It was clear that he took care of himself. That was clear from the fact that we had very similar, muscular body shapes. I could even tell that he shaved his body hair, like me. I wondered for a brief moment if Stiles did that for him, or if he did it himself. But his refusal didn't stop my eager pestering. "Oh come on Derek. Relax a bit. It's hilarious, I promise. If you don't crack a smile at the first few minutes, then we can totally watch something else." 

He just frowned at me before sighing tiredly as the thread reappeared, faint and thin, that connected him to me. It would occasionally appear and disappear, reappearing at times much stronger than all the others. But this time, I wanted it to remain. I wanted it thicker and more substantial than the wisps of association I had managed with before. At the site of _this_ thread, I already knew his answer before he had even said it. "Fine." 

I smiled widely at his words, proud of my success and quickly forced our attention back onto the TV. On the screen four men, two older and two younger, walked into the scene. They were laughing and joking with each other, seemingly colour coordinated in pairs. 

"So, the two blues are father and son. The two guys wearing green are, guess, what?" I asked with repressed glee.

"Father and son?" He replied with an eye roll. 

The four men enter what apparently was their shared summer cabin. They began to talk and joke around with each other. Within just a minute, the topic of conversation turned to sex, causing tremendous embarrassment and apparent arousal between the dads. I knew the moment I won when I saw his mouth twitch. Soon after he couldn't help but chuckle under his breath at the horrible acting, just like I had thought.

"I win!" I exclaimed triumphantly, raising both arms in the air. 

"I wasn't laughing at the jokes. I was laughing at how bad the acting was." He pointed out. The thread strengthened. 

"Doesn't matter. A laugh is a laugh." I said with a wide smile before pressing harder against Derek's side.

Despite his nonchalant manner, I knew the movie was arousing him. I leaned against him, drawn by his musk and the heat of his body. His heart was pumping harder and faster, pushing blood into his cock. But I knew I shouldn't push my luck and worked hard to focus on the movie. Derek did the same. 

We watched the movie with commentary, joking about the characters and the poor acting and the awkward set pieces. At one point after the first pair, one of the 'sons' and his friend's 'dad', decide to hook up and end up head to a bedroom, both actors actually started heading in opposite directions for a moment before the younger one realized he was supposed to be following the older man. By the time they started making out and undressing in the bedroom, both of us were quiet, the room was only filled with the sounds of the sensual kissing of the two actors on screen and our rapidly beating hearts. 

"Actually, we might wake Stiles up. Should we stop here?" I asked Derek, giving him the choice. A thread briefly flashed towards the bedroom, pulling Derek towards it. "I'm having a good time, are you?" 

He was staring at the scene intently for a few seconds before he shook his head slowly. I just nodded and leaned into his side, satisfied that my thread strengthened as the one that briefly flared to pull him towards the bedroom slowly faded. Derek then moved his right hand and placed it against my left thigh. I moved the leg closer against his side, pressing it against his thighs. 

Both of us were just drinking our drinks, slowly getting aroused as the scene unfolded on the screen. I wondered what Derek thought of my arousal. I knew he could smell it. His was now so wonderfully thick, a memorable and intoxicatingly musky scent. It wasn't too different from Stiles, but there was a pleasant sweetness that I liked breathing in. It hit the back of my nostrils like a sweet mint, now much clearer than before, and lingered around in my sinuses, pleasantly. The thread was flaring brighter and thicker than before. 

"I've always wanted took hook up with a dad, to be honest." I shared with a sigh, readjusting myself in my shorts. I purposefully moved my heard cock in a way that it now gently pressed against the wrist of the hand that held my thigh. 

"I've slept with a dad before." He confessed quietly as he watched the older man and his friend's son kiss on the screen. 

I snapped to him quickly in surprise, "what? Seriously?"

"Yeah." He admitted as a sudden fond look clouded his eyes. 

"Like, married-married? With kids and family?" I asked with eager eyes, grabbing his bicep firmly with both of my hands, my drink forgotten on the table. This was a crucial confession, and I had even barely used my influence tonight to pull it from him. If he had actively participated in an infidelity in the past, then it wouldn't be so far fetched for him to do it again. Particularly with me. 

"Yeah. But the wife wasn't in the picture. But he was. With a kid too, yeah." I don't know why he was telling me this story, but he looked surprisingly relieved as he shared the story with me. He looked... comfortable. It was an expression that I enviously found mostly resulted from something Stiles had done. But now, to my happiness, he had given it to me. 

"Oh my god, stop this right now!" I said excitedly, pausing the video mid scene. "I want to know everything." 

"Play the movie." He pressed, trying to take the remote from me half-heartedly.

"No, I want to know!" I insisted, laughing at his feeble attempts at trying to take back the remote. "Tell me. Who was it? Fuck, was it Stiles' dad?"

I had said the last part jokingly, aiming for the absurd, but I saw his body stiffen suddenly at my words. I watched him suddenly work to keep his face even and neutral, an action which only caused my to confirm my wild guess. 

"Oh, shit! It was!" I whispered happily in shock as I lowered my voice to a conspiratorial whisper. I moved closer as he threw a quick look over his shoulder at the bedroom door. "Does Stiles know?" 

He frowned at the TV, looking at the frozen images of the two men on the screen. He turned to face me and sighed heavily before shaking his head stiffly. He stared at me quietly, lost in thought, and I subtly pushed my influence further. There was a small struggle before the thread moved favourably towards me. 

"Do you want to see it?" He suddenly asked. 

In my peripheral vision, I saw a shadow move around. My head snapped to follow it with my eyes, and it looked like a familiar, shadowed, version of Stiles. No... was it me? No... it was Us...

"Do you want to see it?" Derek suddenly asked as a flash pulled me back to the scene. 

"Note here." The Voices replied. "Further."

There was another flash. 

The scene playing before me was hot, to say the least. The look on Derek's face was pure ecstasy as Stiles' father ate out his ass. Soon after, John moves up behind Derek and mounts him easily while holding onto his shoulders. His golden wedding ring was a stark contrast on Derek's pale skin. My hole twitched with every thrust that I could see on the screen as our joint heavy, lustful musk permeated my senses. As I glanced to the side I found that Derek had been staring at my cock. I had freed it from out from the right leg hole of my shorts moments before. I made, long, measured strokes as he watched me intensely. 

"Fuck, Stiles' dad is hot." I muttered, breathing heavier than before. I pushed my influence out once again, feeling him on the precipice of a crucial decision. I knew before he even acted, that he would react in my favour than not. But no matter how far we had gone, he could still have stopped. But I was confident that he wouldn't. I could _smell_ that he wouldn't. I saw that the glowing thread had chosen to wind itself around us snugly, at least for now. But I would take what I could get. I could always weave more later. 

"Had a thick cock too." He replied. "Kinda like yours. Maybe you're bigger."

"You think mine's thicker?" I asked curiously as I worked to keep my eyes trained on the screen. It was a subtle invitation. I stroke my cock in front of him, but he had to be the one to take matters into his own hands. So to speak.

Slowly he reached over and grasped my hard member with his large, warm, hand. I cussed at the act and my cock twitched in response to his touch. 

"Yeah. It's definitely thicker. A bit longer too." He muttered while slowly stroking my hard member. His eyes were flared, his pupils were dilated and intently studying my dick as the cock head peeked out of my foreskin whenever he stroked down on the shaft. He was completely intoxicated by our shared desire. So was I. 

"Anything else?" I asked huskily. 

He leaned in towards my lap at the question. He trained his eyes on my own and slowly, deliberately, leaned down very close to my cock and sniffed down, hard, from the cock head down to my balls. His nose was inches from my junk, and I even felt his breathe tickle my skin. 

"You smell different." He explained.

"That bad?" I asked.

"No. Different." He replied before taking another deep breath. This time, he buried his face, and nose, on my balls. "You smell so fucking good." 

"What else?" I asked again, my head swimming at the sensation of Derek eagerly snuffling my balls and my cock. 

His long, moist, tongue then darted out and swiped up my cock before he moved down to suckle my large balls in his mouth. They popped out as he sucked and stretched them out before he leaned in once more and took my cock in one, obscene, movement. He sucked me down straight to the base, his lips bulged out from the width of my cock. I felt the back of his throat at my cock tip, and my skin vibrate as he lathered it with his tongue, sucking up hard and slow until my cock popped out loudly from his mouth. 

"You really want to do this?" I asked.

"Not here." It replied once again, pulling me out of the scene. "Somewhere else." 

"Isn't it your anniversary?" I asked dubiously as Derek handed me a drink, the sun shining brightly through the windows. 

"Yeah. But Stiles called for a rain cheque. Apparently his TA is taking a whole bunch of people in his Econ class out to a pub." Derek explained. "Stiles says it's his chance to make a good impression, especially since the guy's a douche bag. Just a rich kid who has had everything handed to him and think he's God's gift to man." 

"Weren't you a rich kid?" I asked, smirking at his adorable frowning face.

" _Was_. Not anymore." He mumbled.

"Is he hot?" I couldn't help but ask. 

"Seriously?" Derek stared at me evenly.

"Yeah. Was he?" I asked again with a shrug. 

"Yeah. I guess." Derek shrugged, but at my encouraging look he sighed heavily and pulled out his phone. "Fine, here. Stiles showed me his Instagram account." 

To my surprise, the man in the photos was someone I knew. My cock twitched in my pants at the sudden possibilities that stretched out before me. 

"Holy shit. It's Brody." I said with surprise, grabbing the phone from Derek and scrolling through Brody's feed. 

"You know him?" Derek asked, surprised. 

"Yeah. We've hooked up a few times. He's hot with a nice, thick cock. Knows how to use it too. Fucked me like a bull in heat." I explained and was pleasantly greeted by Derek's arousal filling the air. "Kinky bastard too. Loves fucking bare. Not that that matters to me, cause, you know."

A sudden idea crossed my mind and I quickly decided to send Brody a direct message from Derek's phone. 

_Nice pics_. I typed and sent using Derek's account.

"Too bad he's such an dick." Derek mumbled, seemingly oblivious at what I was doing on his phone, likely thinking that I was still scrolling through Brody's pictures. I was flattered by that level of trust. 

"Like that matters?" I asked dryly, proud of my own mischievousness. 

"It does." Derek nodded.

"Seriously? Like you wouldn't want any of this?" I asked as I looked through one picture in which Brody was mostly naked except for a strategically placed toy rocket-ship over his crotch. "He's into body worship and control. You can really just leg go and be that slut that worships an egotistical alpha. Tell me that you don't think that's hot? After everything, I know you'd hit that." 

_Thanks_. _Yours ain't too bad_ , _almost as ripped as I am_. _You need a more intense workout bud_. Brody replied quickly to my surprise. I smirked at his words. 

"Okay. Yeah, I guess, I would." Derek grumbled as he closed his eyes at the confession. "I've met the guy a few times actually, when I used to pick Stiles up after his classes. He's eye-fucked me a few times. He even had the gall to ask my husband, 'how'd you manage that Stilinski?' like a dim-witted asshole. But man he smells good. And he looks good. He wears these tight fucking jeans and I've seen his cock and I can't help but just want it."

"Oh yeah. As someone how's had it, I can honestly say it's good." I replied. 

"I've actually thought about other stuff. Like Brody mounting me in my bed while Stiles is at school. It's so fucking bad, but I can't stop thinking about it." He admitted sadly. "I just want to lick every inch of him, taste his hole and his seed and for him to breed me. It's fucking driven me nuts!" 

_How about giving me that intense workout sometime_? I replied as Derek, only half paying attention to Derek's confession. I even sent a nude photo I had taken of Derek with his phone one night in the message.

"How fucked up is that?" Derek asked sadly. "I've fantasized about the guy that's such an asshole to my husband."

"Derek, we've talked about this." I replied, turning my attention from the phone to the struggling Were in front of me. "It's not the same. These are just fantasies, right? Stiles is the reality. You want to support that reality and the only way to do it is to take part in the fantasies." 

"But..." He began, shaking his. Very briefly, I saw another thread form that headed out of the door, threatening to take Derek away from me. I pulled on the current thread that bound us and it moved me towards the right direction with ease. 

"Aren't you allowed to feel good?" I asked. 

"What?" Derek asked, suddenly confused. 

"Derek. It's your anniversary. Shouldn't he be spending it with you? You're more important. You should be, at least." I argued. " _That's_ fucked up. He's doing something that makes him happy, why can't you?" 

"It's not the same." Derek frowned at my words, but the new thread was slowly fading. 

"No. His reasons are frivolous. _Your_ trying to make money for him and _his_ lifestyle. You're taking good care of him. He doesn't even realize that the money he gives you isn't even half of the rent to cover this apartment. You are making him feel good." I pointed out. "You're entitled to feel good too. You're a good guy Derek. It's just sex. What you have with Stiles is bond that's better than that." 

"Yeah. I guess." Derek shrugged and nodded as the last semblance of the thread faded into oblivion, while mine gripped around his form even tighter. "You're right." 

"Why aren't you with him? You could join him. Wanna crash the pub? I betcha they'd be mighty impressed with meeting Stiles' hot for trot beau." I said playfully with a wink. 

_Absofuckinglutely_. Brody replied.

Derek smiled shyly at his comment. "It's alright. We do have plans in the weekend though. He booked us a spa for a few days. That should be... interesting."

"You're not really the spa type." I asked with a confused smile.

"Stiles has never been and he wanted to go." Derek muttered. 

I suddenly clapped my hands, the thread beckoning me to come clean about Brody. "Alright. Confession time!" 

"Not here." The Voices insisted again, flashing the space out of existence. 

Suddenly we were in their bedroom. Stiles had just left for class but I had snuck in easily right before. I had managed to hide in a few places until Stiles had fully left. Derek had even helped avert some potentially discoveries, to my relief. There was something odd happening to Stiles of late that worried me. He seemed odd. But Derek doesn't seem to have noticed. Or maybe, at this point, he had stopped caring. Or cared about something else _and_ him? 

"Well, what do _you_ want?" I asked as I moved to straddle Derek's lap as he lay on the bed, slowly grinding his hips and massaging his shoulders.

"Um..." Derek said, flustered, his hands moved to caress my hips. 

"Come on Derek, tell me what you want." I whispered seductively in Derek's ear, slowly grinding down on Derek's lap. 

"Uhm... fuck... I..." Derek stammered, his hands tightened on my well shaped ass. 

"Don't you want to tell me?" I asked as I nipped at Derek's earlobe. 

"I want you," Derek whispered quietly into my shoulder. "I want you to knot me." 

"I thought you'd never ask." I replied happily with a wide smile on my face before capturing Derek's face in my hands for a deep, obscenely tongue-filled, kiss. 

The room flashed once again.

"Are we closer? We can feel it. It's there. Just a little further?" It said happily as the scene changed and I changed with it. 

The cock in front me was long, thick, and wet, lathered with the combined spit and slobber of the two men kneeling before it. 

"No, I don't really care." Brody replied condescendingly over the phone. He sat naked on the couch, one arm thrown over the spine of the couch with a beer in hand, while he talked on his cell with the other. "Look, if it's fucking late. It's fucking late. 5 minutes past due might as well be not handed in at all, for all I care. This means, you get a 0."

I licked the shaft and sucked on the leaking cock-head while, not far below me, Derek suckled on Brody's large, groomed smooth balls. Derek knelt on the floor with a cock cage over his dick and a chain necklace around his neck. Attached to the necklace was a dog-bone tag with Derek's name and 'Property of Brody' on the back, something Brody had forced Derek to buy. Derek moved up from Brody's bulbous balls and licked his way up the man's thick shaft. I moved out of the way as Derek took it down in one swallow. 

"But, you know what? I'm not a complete asshole, Stiles." Brody smirked down as he watched Derek bob up and down his cock. "Tell you what, if you rewrite another paper and hand it in by tomorrow morning, I'll take a look at it. You can't get anything past a B buddy, but that's better than nothing, right? Hold on."

He placed the phone on face down on the couch spine before staring down at Derek's annoyed eyes. Derek removed from the thick cock with a pop, his lips looked raw and covered in slobber. 

"Ease up on my husband." Derek said evenly. But at Brody's raised brow, he sighed and added, "please. Sir." 

"What the fuck do you think I'm doing?" Brody replied dryly, sneering at Derek's attempt at defending his husband. "Now, I need to piss so get back down there. You better not fucking spill a drop. You, get me another beer." 

He shook the can in my direction as Derek glowered once more at Brody's obnoxious face before sucking the cock back in his mouth. Despite the reaction, I could smell a sharp spike in Derek's arousal. It was mixed with suppressed frustration and anger, but the arousal was palpable and almost stifled all of the other scents. At the sudden smell of asparagus filling the room, I knew that Brody was unloading his urine in Derek's willing mouth. On the ground, Derek's ejaculate coated the floor without even his need to touch it.

There was another flash and the Voices once again spoke with desperate, impatient, yet gleeful voices. "Too far! We must leap the other way to reach it. It's coming!" 

"Shouldn't you have done this, like, the moment you guys moved in?" I asked, working to keep the frustration in my voice from manifesting. I looked at all the boxes that littered the room and suppressed a sigh. The thread had led me here, and I knew that any appearance of discontent would jeopardize my chances with Derek. 

"Yeah, but, you know." Stiles just mumbled awkwardly. "Hey, thanks for helping out. Um... Ace, right?"

"Yeah. I know, weird name." I said with a nod. 

"Not as weird as Stiles." He replied with an awkward laugh. 

"You win." I smiled in return, working to keep my voice genuine. "Look, I'm glad to help out. Derek's one of the few guys at the site I can actually tolerate. There's a lot of stuff here. Where do you want them?"

"Um, just wherever." Stiles replied absently as a new thread caught my eye. "I wish Derek would come back with that pizza already."

"We just started." I replied absentmindedly as I followed and pulled on the thread that lead me to a box. I opened it carefully and scrounged through the disorganized contents to find the source. It was a little, black, leather book. _Gruffmasterson's Mating Manual: An Abridged Guide on how to Mate Well!_ It seemed to be new and barely used. The pages were still crisp and fresh, save for an odd liquid that stained the first few pages. Were they tears? Or something else? The thread compelled me to ask Stiles. "Stiles, what is this? It looks like a little journal?"

"Oh, yeah. I have tons of those." Stiles replied absentmindedly as he dug through a particularly large box. "It's a lot of people's go-to-gift for me for some reason. That or copies of The Secret. Is it The Secret?"

"No. It's not The Secret. If you don't want it, can I have it?" I asked, waving the back of the book from a distance. 

Stiles briefly glanced over and narrowed his eyes at the object before shaking his head. "Nah, it's yours. Have fun. Write The Secret." 

Then the scene shone and froze in a still, orange light. I was shaped back into myself, moving out of Ace's memories and now stood only to witness it's frozen form. I shuddered after all of the things I had seen and felt. It was then that I found out what it was like to be aroused in someone's else's mind as a wisp of an Ego riding an Id that wasn't it's own. It was a confusing sensation being aroused by memories that weren't my own but had lived through, but be angered by as someone else who had been a victim of them. I could barely articulate it in Ace's minds. For a moment, I thought the Voices would interject in my reverie, but they did not seem to have heard my musings. At the very least, maybe they didn't care much for it. Instead they narrowed their eyes at the book in Ace's hands. It took me another moment to realize what that meant. 

_That's his tail_? _He turned my fucking Mating Manual into his tail_? He yelled into... Ace's?, mind. _You goddamn bastard_! _You gross_ , _manipulative_ , _bastard_! _You_ ' _re not even that hot_!

"It's weak." The Voices replied. "It is not the first. It is the newest. We need the oldest."

_Look, I don_ ' _t want to go back into that_. _That_ _was too much_! I insisted. 

"A lie." It replied. "You were aroused, we know. Angry, yes. The rage is real, yes. But aroused too. It fuels your libido as much as you anger. It is good to be happy as you watch the world burn. It prepares you for after. For Us." 

_I am_ not. I insisted and shook my head to refute the words. 

"Wounds heal and grow thicker skin." They replied. "It allows another and better chance at revenge. 

I watched it circle me slowly, shifting visions between my void-self and my twisted, Dark Oak face. 

"Power doesn't come without a little pain and struggle." It whispered before it shifted the world once more, plunging me into another man's memories. 

It was a mild, dark, night. In the distance, the booming sounds of music played while happy, and drunk, people milled about in the distance. We had moved a fair ways away from the front of the club, away from the busiest area of the street. We were waiting for his mate to finish at the bathrooms in the club. My nose wrinkled at the thought of him using a public place to take a number two. 

"Fuck, I need to piss." Derek muttered, turning around to walk back to the club. But I quickly pulled him aside and dragged him just past the mouth of the nearest alleyway where we were barely hidden from the street. "What are you doing?"

"You said you needed to piss." I said deviously with a wink as I quickly got down on my knees and fished his flaccid cock from his pants. 

"Here?" Derek asked, surprised. 

"Well, you better hurry up. Stiles could come out any minute." I replied before putting the dick in my mouth, looking up at Derek with heavy lidded eyes. 

"Shit." Derek cussed as he began to let go, caressing my hair as he unloaded in my mouth. "Crap, I can hear Stiles. He's coming out." 

He watched me, eyes wide with wonder, and occasionally caressed my pulsating throat as I swallowed his golden stream. 

I saved a mouthful when I noticed the stream slow. Hearing Stiles call for us in the distance, I quickly stood up and pulled Derek in for a deep kiss. Derek's eyes widened with surprise as he realized that I had kept a mouthful of his piss and was now unloading it in his mouth with the kiss. We kissed passionately, wrestling with our tongues as we moved the piss between us until he had swallowed it all. 

"Derek?" I heard Stiles' drunken voice call out in the distance as I watched Derek swallow his own urine. 

Derek was about to move towards his mate's call when I stopped him with one hand and began unzipping with the other. I ignored the barely registered thread that pulled at him towards his husband. Such a thread wasn't enough to sever the desires that wound around him like a blanket. "Aren't you thirsty? And you're not the only one who needs the can." 

"Stiles is calling for me." Derek said, trying to move away, the thread shining brightly for a moment, seemingly stronger to my utmost surprise. 

I pushed my influence out at it's fullest as I sensed the barest of hesitations from his constitution. I knew he wanted it too. I leaned closely, and whispered in his ear. 

"Well then you better get to it. I know you want to taste it, don't you Derek?" I mouthed softly in his ear as his heart started to pump loudly. "It'd be so hot if you drink me. Don't you want to taste me? And wouldn't it be hot if you kissed Stiles after? Maybe he'll grow to like the taste too." 

His heart fluttered at the suggestion as his eyes widened at my words. That thread didn't break, instead it wound around and looped around the existing ones that fed Derek's desires and tied him to me. I could live with that. I could live with the sharing.

With a quick nod, he eagerly got down on his knees and took my cock in his mouth. I unloaded in his mouth with a sigh and, initially, the Were choked and coughed but quickly rallied and barely spilled anything onto his tight fitting shirt. Stiles' voice slowly faded into the distance as he continued to call for his husband. 

By the time we had caught up with Stiles five minutes later, he had already walked a few blocks away in the wrong direction. To my nose Derek stank of piss and other men's arousal, and even other things. He had fed from me in the bathrooms while Stiles danced alone, drunkenly, at the club. He had even fed from other men while I watched. And who knew what other things he did during the moments I had taken the time to dance with Stiles. But it had made him happy. I knew what made him happy. It made me happy too. Derek eagerly pulled his mate into a lustful and tongue filled kiss the moment he had moved within reaching distance.

Stiles drunkenly laughed after the kiss, and playfully slapped Derek's firm chest. "Your mouth tastes like piss."

"It does?" Derek smiled fondly down at his mate, and a quick pang of jealously hit my heart. 

"Must be your imagination." I replied with as much levity as I could muster as Stiles drunkenly, and publicly, fondles his husband. "Does this mean you know what piss tastes like?" 

"No, but it does! Here!" He exclaimed as he suddenly, to our surprise, pulled me into a quick kiss. "There! Doesn't it?"

"No, I don't see it." I replied teasingly at the unexpected act. "I might need to verify directly from the source."

"Yeah, Derek. Go kiss him!" Stiles suddenly insisted, slightly slurring his words. 

"Yeah, no, I don't think-" Derek began but I quickly interrupted what he was about to say.

"Sure thing. Come here!" I said with a wild smile before pulling in Derek into a deep and lustful kiss. 

"See?" Stiles said drunkenly with a wide innocent smile on his face. 

I sensed Derek's cock hardening in his pants, but also felt his thread waver at doing this in front of his mate. So, despite the contradicting arousal that filled my nostrils, I slowly pulled away and smiled at Stiles. I gave his hard cock a quick, covert, squeeze before moving away. Derek cleared his throat awkwardly and turned to smile sheepishly at his husband. 

"Yep, definitely piss." I replied, causing Stiles to pump his hands in the air with jubilation at my agreement. 

"Faster. Someone's coming soon." The Voices suddenly insisted as they pushed me onto another memory. 

I had grown used to the quick flashes and the sudden changes in scenery. It was an odd thing to be someone else, and momentarily live as that person with exactly how they felt and thought in that moment, but be aware of an existence separate from it. This was a realm of the manipulation of memories that I was totally ignorant of. 

"Have you ever taken another knot since me?" I asked.

We were in a red-lit room. There were tables full of familiar things as well as swings, whips, and buckets full of lube and oil. Along one corner was a large selection of varied sizes of dildos, butt plugs, anal beads, and other things. There was even a baseball bat. 

"Fuck, uhm, no. Just yours. But..." Derek replied huskily, eyeing the large, black knotted dildo in my hands as I slathered it enthusiastically with a copious amount of lube. "That looks familiar." 

I smiled widely at his words. "I'm glad you noticed. I made it out of a mould of my knotted cock."

"Seriously?" Derek asked with surprise and wonder as he studied the thing in my hands. 

"Yeah. We can do it to you too one day. Get one of those make-your-own-dildo kits." I said with a smile as I moved closer to his prone, presenting form on the leather swings. 

His hair had just been recently buzzed, as he had been convinced by one of the others earlier to try a skinhead look for a bit. They had shaved other parts of him too. All the hair that remained were his eyebrows and eyelashes. I admired the work they had done on his ass, and felt the smoothness of his hole. I took my time to admire my own handiwork and caressed the tattoo on his thigh. 

"You look so beautiful like this, you know?" I replied, caressing his oiled body before punching him playfully on his pecs. "You've been so good lately. Stiles doesn't know what he's missing. Are you happy?"

"Fuck yeah." Derek mumbled as he took a sniff of something in a little bottle. He had grown accustomed and eager for the little sniffing potions I had supplied for him shortly after we had increased our sexual play. Regular poppers were ineffective against most Weres, and not at all for Derek. I watched his eyes dilate maddeningly wide as his arousal spiked through the roof, almost stifling the room with a sudden burst of his musk. His hole began to twitch with anticipation. 

"You're going to look so good with this in you. My happy wolf." I said huskily as I aimed my constructed self into his pulsing, eager hole.

The scene froze before me and I found myself as myself once more. Shifting my Ego was easier now than it had been before, and I circled the scene with shock and profound distaste.

_You've got to be kidding me_. I said evenly as I stared at the massive black thing in Ace's hands, primed to be pushed into my husband's intoxicated hole. 

"No." The Voices replied with an unimpressed look on their faces, that now shifted continually from one thing to another.

_A dildo_? I exclaimed disbelievingly. _A fucking dildo_? _He turned a dildo moulded form his own cock as his first tail_? 

"Yes." The Voices replied. 

_What a fucking degenerate_. I screamed at Ace's frozen face. 

"Well. This _is_ a first." The Voices confessed. "But we know what it is. We know where it is. We can go there. We..."

Their Voices cut off as their heads suddenly snapped up into the ceiling. Suddenly I was pulled out of Ace's toxic mind and shoved into my own body. I was a spectator once more as the Voices quickly moved my body towards the door. 

_What happened_? I asked, vaguely disturbed by the realization that it had grown more difficult for me to access information from my own mind. Or at least, from the Voices. 

My body moved out of the door and quickly, and silently, closed it shut behind me as Anastasia suddenly walked through the front doors. 

"There you are." Anastasia declared. "What a fucking day. I'm just about to finish my evening and suddenly there's a motherfucking earthquake. You know what it's like being in a roomful of drag queens in an earthquake? I mean damn, it was just a tiny itty-bitty thing. But you'd think a bomb had gone off." 

The Voices smiled at her sweetly as they kept my hands at their back and holding onto the door handle. 

"What're you doing?" Anastasia asked, quickly growing aware of my odd demeanour. She tried peeking through the tinted glass of the meeting room/my make-shift bedroom before training her critical eyes back on the body that I couldn't control. 

I felt the Voices grow tired at her sudden inquisitiveness. I felt something else. I felt the danger before it had even manifested as a thought. To my horror, the blood-lust filled our minds with all the voices clamouring for attention. 

I offered mine into the din, letting out a scream that broke through the glass voices and unbridled thoughts. It was mine that needed to be heard. As the decision came to fruition in their minds, I pushed my own. 

The Voices moved towards Anastasia as she stood still and merely stared back in confusion. 

In my mind with as much power as I could muster, I repeated one word. 

_NO_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right. The previous iteration of this chapter ended a bit further along, past Stiles meeting up with Anastasia. 
> 
> I'm expanding other chapters after this, including encounters with Peter and Stiles' father. Hopefully they'll be more substantial as a result. Instead of feeling rushed... (at least it was in my head).
> 
> Also I want to acknowledge all those who wrote stuff based on this fic or dedicated to this fic. You are all awesome and wonderful and I am flattered and flabbergasted beyond belief! :O Thank you!


	17. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Voices make shadows as Stiles falls into more memories.
> 
> *Trigger Warning* : More dubious consent in this chapter (as per story tag). It involves arguments about repeatedly given and withdrawn consent during/after sexual acts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: The Sheriff should be John Stilinski here. Not Noah. Edited the mistake the chapter before last. This chapter mentions a different Noah. Noah Patrick (just check the Teen Wolf wikia if you don't know who that is). 
> 
> Also. I'm writing this using Word 2002 on my computer. Which crashed (my computer) two weeks ago while I was writing this chapter and I lost 8 pages. I got so pissed off I stepped away for a while. I copied and pasted it on Google Docs now just in case. So no, this fic isn't abandoned. 
> 
> This chapter clocked at about 34 pages. Once again it's BARELY edited. I'll do it later. Sorry. Lol. Just point out stuff that doesn't make sense if you can. I jumped back and forth while writing this, and when I lost those 8 pages, I kinda also lost my patience. I gave it a quick once over, but I'm basically just hoping it still all flows right because I wanted to post this ASAP since I haven't done so in a few weeks. I hope I used the correct names this time, at least. Lemme know if there are parts that don't flow well or don't make sense. Honestly, at this point I'm just thinking of editing all of this in once go once I finished.

It was an odd sensation being so at odds with your own mind while being stuck in it. The Voices seemed to fill the air around me, and any other voices of dissent, other than my own, were slowly being drowned out by stifling rage. I felt the Voices that had taken my body move and curved my lips upwards in a disarming smile. Anastasia tilted her head curiously, an eyebrow raised inquiringly. My body stood frozen mid-act, the un-clawed hand suspended in the air, the other hidden behind my back, as my steps halted on the spot. 

"Stiles, are you alright?" She asked quizzically. Her words were soft in the quiet hallway, unable to hear the cacophony in my head. 

The blood-lust manifested in a violent waves of images that weren't my own. They permeated a dark desire that I feared stemmed from my own. These images punctured and tore at Anastasia's skin, or perhaps just a quick slice of her throat with the fox's claws. Or there were images of my body gouging out her eyes, peeling her nails, and broke her bones as she screamed with excruciating pain. The Voices' laughter seemed like a deafening chant amidst the slaughter as they shredded her skin, burned her tongue, and drank her blood in a ritual that fueled their madness and their power. All of these images flew through our mind in a whirlwind and swept me into the madness of their thoughts. For a moment, I lost myself even further, just a helpless cog in a broken wheel that sank into the mud of psychosis. But as they stepped closer to her, as their dark desires further took root and shaped itself into a bloody, sinister act, a tiny spark jolted me back into myself and turned into the perch on which I pulled myself out of the mire. 

_Don't you dare_. I growled at the Voices in my mind as I took hold of the spark to pull back their desires and to take back control. 

They tried to flood my mind with their discontent, filling my thoughts with their violent range mixed with wanton hunger. But I trudged on, holding my goodness as close to my thoughts as I could manage, as I tried my best to keep my mind and my morality to myself. 

_Revenge for those who deserve it_. _She doesn't deserve it_. I pressed, desperate to say anything that would loosen the will of the Voices. If they had been borne out of my desire for revenge stemming from Derek's betrayal, then perhaps I could at least focus their rage on him instead of someone else. 

_She's in the way_. The Voices retorted. 

_No_. I yelled in my mind. To my surprise, my own voice reverberated in this space and drowned out all others, burning the images into smoke and ash. My intent echoed throughout my being and etched itself in my will, overcoming their own.

My body had only been frozen for a few seconds, but still it seemed much longer and must have looked so curious to her. My footsteps were half-moved in an awkward position, as my hands were partially raised is it were reaching for something. Anastasia twitched to move towards me when I once again lost control of my body. But at this point, I knew what the new intent was before the Voices even acted upon them. 

"Sorry. Just, tired. It's been a long morning. The earthquake rattled me too." The Voices laughed awkwardly with my voice. 

"Clearly." She replied dubiously after a beat of silence she spent studying my face, her eyes narrowed curiously. She then shook her head before looking back into my eyes. "Well, whatever. I haven't had any sleep since yesterday and I have another show tonight. Have you seen Peter? He's been ignoring my calls and I need to shove a broom handle up his ass."

My eyebrow raised curiously as the Voices tilted my head in wonder.

"So to speak. I'm kidding." Anastasia stressed in awkward acknowledgement of my curious response. "But not really. Jesus Stiles, are you really okay? Did something happen? Where's your little friend?"

"We're on a bit of a break." The Voices replied quickly. "She grabbed something to eat while I decided to grab a change of clothes." 

"Why? You look great." She pouted, eyeing my ensemble with some pride. 

"It's not for me." The Voices smiled sweetly. 

"Mhm. Whatever." Anastasia replied with pursed lips. "Clean up in there. Anna's using that room later for a meeting. The last thing those kids need is seeing your panties on the coffee table." 

"Stiles doesn't wear underwear." The Voices replied to my horror. "Most of the time." 

Anastasia raises a curious eyebrow, her gaze briefly shot down at my crotch. "Alright. You do you boo." 

With a casual wave over her back, she walks up the stairs with a sway of her hips and without looking back. 

"You'll regret that." The Voices said casually as Anastasia's figure disappeared back into her room. 

_Not everyone is out to get me_. I insisted, despite the sting of my most recent betrayals. 

"Mhm." Was their only reply as they tilted their head curiously at my words. 

As they moved back into the room, I worked to take down the walls I had realized they had begun to build inside my own mind. It didn't take very long to realize that I couldn't make heads or tails with how it had been done. I only knew I was loosing control.

"You already have." They replied. "But there's no need for concern. We are bound to fulfill your desire."

_What exactly are you doing_? I asked curiously. Still disturbed, I noted how the Voices were now managing to hide things more skilfully than they had done before. _What now_? _What are you going to do with the information we found_? 

“We need something stronger than you.” The Voices responded out loud. 

They walked past Ace’s unconscious body and looked down at Deaton’s peacefully unconscious face. 

“Wake up.” The Voices said as they stood over Deaton's unconscious form. With a hard kick at Deaton’s ribs, the older man gasped and winced in pain at the blow before his eyes shot wide open. He took heavy, gasping, breaths as he looked around himself and looked up with surprise at my face. 

“You’re not Stiles.” He said with an impassive face. 

“Very good.” The Voices smiled sweetly. 

“What do you want?” Deaton asked, his gaze shooting over to Ace’s broken form. 

“This spark has dimmed. We need yours.” The Voices replied before lunging forward and burying their fists in Deaton’s chest. 

In my mind, I was startled with shock at the sight. But to my surprise, no blood spurted out, nor was there any sign of torn viscera. Instead, it just seemed like my hand had phased through Deaton’s chest and clutched at something inside. Despite the curious appearance, the act of it seemed to have caused Deaton significant pain. His face contorted in pain, tilted up at the sky, his mouth opened wide in a disconcertingly silent howl. I knew that there should have been a deafening sound of excruciating pain, but the Voices had somehow muffled them. But to my surprise, the older man fought against the pain and the pressure of his own spark being bastardized against him. Despite the excruciating pain and the wild spasm of his muscle, he reach up and cupped my forehead with his hands. The significance of this act was lost on me, but I felt the Voices react at something the Druid had done and I felt their rage as much as their concern. 

But the loudest voice in the cacophony was of their pride. The Voices scoffed at Deaton's act and leaned down with a sneer to whisper in his face. Deaton whispered words that I couldn't hear and _I_ felt something from his touch that I knew the Voices could not. I was certain they were oblivious of that as much as they were ignorant of my thoughts on the matter. Somehow, my minute observation had been ignored or missed, and the Voices celebrated in their apparent victory against the Druid's efforts, whatever they may have been.

"You failed." 

With those words the Voices plunged our hand deeper into Deaton's chest, causing the man's hand's to blow back and rattle against the ground. He thrashed on the ground while the Voices rummaged inside his chest until their (my) eyes glowed a golden hue and we shifted once more in a quick, bright, blur.

The spaced morphed and twisted, the shapes bleeding onto each other into colourful, melted waves as a cacophony of curious sounds filled the air. They were like a mixture of singing birds mixed with the sound of a deep, rumbling, ringing gong. The sounds vibrated in the air as fast and hard as the space around us until it all suddenly stopped. The Voices pulled out their hand from Deaton’s chest just as the older man, once again, loses his consciousness. To my relief, I was certain that he was still alive. The Voices, with my eyes, looked about us. We were in an unfamiliar apartment that was obnoxiously decorated with silver furniture and black, leather couches. 

_Where now_? I asked, trying to think away from thinking about what I think may have happened. I was of two minds at what I suspected Deaton had done. But the rational part of me feared the creature that I had become. 

But they didn't bother responding to my query as the owner of this space was quickly resolved in my mind. We were at Ace's apartment. 

_Why did you bring us here_? I asked. _Wait_. _Don’t tell me_. _Of course_. _He hid his tail_ _here_. _My fucking manual_. 

The Voices walked confidently towards the far side of the large apartment. I couldn't help but be pissed off by the fact that an apparent construction worker had a much larger apartment than hours, in San Francisco no less. Of course, that may very well have been a lie in one way or another. It would not have surprised me the least if he had made money by doing other things. 

"Stop being naive. Of course he has. How do you think Derek has made most of his money for the past year or so?" The Voices sneered at my thought. 

_I don't need you to lecture me on my own failures_. I griped.

"Clearly you do. In fact, it's better to show you." The Voices replied as we walked through the doorway of Ace's bedroom. "We had already accessed those memories while you were busy being lost in his mind."

_Don't you fu-_ I began but my words quickly vanished as we moved through the threshold and the space warped and folded once again. Instead of the vacant bedroom we had arrived in and the sun outside the windows, I was on the bed, thrusting into a warm, slick, hole. 

"Fuck baby, you're so good." I whispered in his ear as I started to thrust harder into his willing hole. Derek looks up at me with half lidded eyes, his legs wound around my waist as I repeatedly plunged into his willing, eager, ass. "You're so good. So good and beautiful. You take my knot so good."

My thrusts became erratic as that familiar sensation vibrated in my pelvis. Derek's quick gasps of breaths turned into one elongated moan as my the skin at the base of my cock stretched and swelled into my knot. I thrust as deep as I can, making sure the knot would take and tie us together. Below me Derek closed his eyes in bliss. 

"Fuck, Derek. You're so good and beautiful." I whispered in his ear as I collapsed on top of his heaving, sweaty, hard body. I bit and nipped at the skin of his neck as my knot swelled and filled him with my seed. "I love filling you up. I love knotting you. I love making you stink like me. I love you."

Derek's body spasms underneath me. I quickly take hold of his cock from the base and I quickly feel his knot swell just as he ejaculates a copious amount of cum between us. 

"Oh, fuck!" Were the only words that Derek managed to say. I was resolved to make sure he would say those three words back to me one day. I was certain he was reluctant to say them now, at least out loud, but I knew he felt them. I felt the evidence of it in my hand as I squeezed his bulging knot tightly as he coated our bodies with a deluge of his semen. 

"So good, baby. So good." I whispered as I began to gnaw on the flesh of his neck, making indentations on the skin with my teeth. Between his still cumming cock between us, and my cock still seeding him inside, the bedroom quickly filled with the musk of our combined release. This was one of my favourite parts of fucking each other alone. We couldn't knot each other with most strangers or other partners, but we could be free to knot and breed each other in this den. "Wish I could keep filling you up till it takes. Fill you until I knock you up."

Derek laughs at my words as he leaned back against the damp pillows, soaked with our combined sweat. "Fuck, you have a dirty mouth." 

"Please, you love it." I chuckled back against his neck. I pulled back and caressed the mark I had made on his thigh with care, currently covered in sweat and cum. "He really hasn't noticed the tattoo?"

Derek shakes his head and I smiled. 

"You didn't try to show it to him?" I asked, despite knowing full well what the answer would be. 

He shakes his head again, and I smiled even wider. 

"That's because he doesn't care." I whispered into his ear. Derek closes his eyes and winced at my words. "But I do." 

A partial truth that he didn't need to know. It was a simple thing to tie a delusion on the thing and Stiles' perception of it. It wasn't not that Stiles would not be able to see it, but more that he wouldn't not want to. Even if Derek had asked him to look. I knew this would have both rankled Derek and turned him on, having another man's mark on his skin that his mate refused to acknowledge whether through sheer ignorance or wilful denial. 

Suddenly Derek's phone vibrates and absentmindedly, he picks it up without a second though. 

"Hello?" Derek asked tiredly before his eyes snapped wide open and winced at the voice on the other end. "Stiles."

"Are you on your way home yet? This cold is really bugging me and I want the meds. Did you get the chicken soup too?" A hoarse Stiles asked from the phone. With my enhanced ears I even heard the human's gross, snotty, sniffles. 

"Uh, yeah. Sorry. There's a lot of traffic. I'm still on my way to the store." Derek replied. He bit his lips as I rocked my pelvis forward and poked his prostate with my still hard, ejaculating cock. Derek's eyes rolled into his head as I nibbled no the flesh of his neck, tweaked a hard nipple with one hand, and hardened my grip on his knot with the other. 

"You haven't even bough the meds yet?" Stiles griped on the phone. 

"Hi, Stiles!" I suddenly said after a flash of inspiration. Derek's eyes widened with shock at my sudden act. 

"Was that Ace?" Stiles asked with surprise at the sudden sound of my voice. 

"Uh, yeah." Derek stammered, at a loss for words. I quickly let go of Derek's nipple and took the phone from the surprised man, a wide smirk on my face. 

"Hey, Stiles." I said to the phone, Derek looking angry and embarrassed below me. But considering the thread between us was as strong as ever, I knew he wasn't all that angry. In response, I just tightened my fist against his knot and rolled my pelvis into his ass once again. He quickly covers his mouth with the back of his hand in an effort to muffle the wave of pleasure that clearly just racked his body. "Sorry I monopolized your man. I found out he was heading my direction and asked him to pick me up since I wanted to go to the store too. We got stuck in traffic because of it. How are you holding up? He told me you were sick?" 

"Oh. Uh, yeah..." Stiles replied after the deluge of words I had just unloaded on him. I smiled widely as Derek's body twisted in pleasure below me every time I moved my pelvis forward. "Okay. Yeah. It's alright. Um, well... I guess it's alright. I didn't know he picked you up. I mean it's already been an hour and I was wondering where he was." 

"Yeah, the traffic's pretty bad." I said to the phone as I moved my free hand and scooped up a copious amount of Derek's cum off his heaving body. He looked up curiously at me and I just smiled as I moved my cum covered hand to his mouth. He quickly started lapping at my cum covered hand and sucked on my fingers as I spoke to his husband on the phone. "Listen, Derek's still driving so it's not a good idea to be on the phone even if we're not really moving. Why don't you take a nap and I promise I'll have him home as soon as possible."

"Yeah. Okay. That makes sense." Stiles mumbled tiredly on the phone as I quickly pulled Derek's still ejaculating cock before scooping up more of his cum to feed to him. "Well, can you tell him I actually have some dinner out for him? He hasn't had anything to eat yet." 

"Oh, don't worry bud. I'm feeding him." I said wickedly with a smile as I fed Derek more of his cum. I also had every intention of collecting the cum I shot inside him and feeding that to him too. Derek loved it when I did that with my mouth. "He'll be full before you get him back." 

"Oh, okay. I'll let you guys go then." Stiles replied awkwardly before I hung up the phone without another word. 

"You're an asshole." Derek replied angrily. He really was angry. I could smell it in the air, mixing with the scent of our sex. But clearly it wasn't enough to jeopardize our tie. 

"Please, you liked it." I laughed at the wolf as my knot still pumped him full of my seed. 

The space shifted back in place as quickly as it had come. I was no longer Ace and I was back to being the passenger in my own mind. The bedroom was empty as I came back at a time where the Voices were rummaging around Ace's drawers. 

"There were many memories of such things, you know. Some were with other men, the three or more of them entwined in licentious sodomy. Some were with Ace just watching Derek in the throes of passion. Some were Ace catching Derek in someone else's arms. Other were of Ace watching Derek's escapades on video." The Voices explained as he reached deep inside a cupboard to pull out a small, worn, vandalized book. 

_Fuck you_ , I whispered sadly, hurt by what I had seen. 

"No you weren't. Not entirely." The Voices chuckled at my response, likely responding to my hurt than my words. "Yes. That's right. Sure you're undeniably angry. Rightfully so. But it turned you on. A part of you is more angry that you had been denied a choice, shamed by Derek's callousness, and the recklessness of his actions. He may be a wolf, but you're just a wilted Druid who has abandoned his studies both in martial and the ways of the wise. The ways this could ruin you. The ways this _has_ ruined you."

_Fuck you_ , I whispered again. 

"Some people would appreciate the help of an aged being articulating their muddled thoughts and desires. You've wished for it all of this time. You called for us in the dark. you shaped us with your withering spark. You made us the weapon you desired to end the misery and confusion in your heart. You should be happier. At the very least, more relieved." The Voices said. "You wanted this." 

_I don't know what I want_. 

"We do." The Voices said back in unison and flooded my mind with their unified words. "It's done, anyway. You no longer have a choice."

_I do_ , I replied, refuting its words. _This is_ my _mind and my body_. _All I have to do is bind you to me_. _I can make you take my lead_. 

"You haven't and you can't." The Voices replied calmly as they caressed the vandalized mating manual in our hands. "You're weak."

_I'm working on it_. I snapped back at it's words as the Voices slowly flipped the pages of the thing. 

"That's fine. Power doesn't come without a little pain and struggle." It whispered as it slowly flipped the page and studied the amendments Ace had made on the book. 

Words had been crossed out and many of the words appeared smeared and faded. But the words of the thing filled my mind as the Voices deigned to allow me to take part in the interpretation of the book as well as the vandalized contents. 

"He was a failure as a wolf. A failure as a man. A failure as a husband. A failure as a member of your pack." The Voices replied as they caressed a series of symbols that had been embedded on the page. "Is it clearer now? Do you see it?"

_How do I know this is real_ , _and not something you're just making me see_? I asked as the information they had gained flooded my mind. 

Ace had indeed turned my mating manual into his new tail. He had bastardized it's intention with the profanity of his own marks, reflected in blood and cum stained runes on the worn page. References of the importance of shaping ties between mates had been crossed or smeared out with blood and cum. Passages that warned of the importance of the knot and the time that needed to be invested between mates in isolation in their den across many moons had been scratched or torn away. But the Voices shaped the things back with older magics, although they didn't bother to undo the power that had been poured in the thing.

"Because we can shape it instead into something useful." The Voices replied to my observation. "You both were ignorant fools who knew nothing of the power of the tie between lovers of your kind, a creature of the moon and a guardian of the wood. Frankly, your pack is full of fools. We're really quite surprised you all are still alive." 

_You don't know anything about my pack_. I replied with indignation. 

"Oh, we know far more than you would think, little one." They smiled mischievously. 

Then I felt the Voices shaped the spark within me, utilizing something else to charge it into something dangerous. The charge felt familiar, and quickly I knew that it had been a piece of something they had taken from Deaton. 

"Obviously." The Voices replied dryly before they tore the book in half with burning hands. I sadly watched the book burn quickly and devolve into black ash on the floor. "You never heeded its words. You won't miss them."

As quickly as those words were spoken, the ash on the ground began to tremble on the ground began to grow. The Voices stepped back as the ash grew and multiplied at a shocking rate. It grew into two tall black, shapes that shifted and twitched into a clearer shape. To my horror, the ash creatures shifted and changed into bodies that bore a striking resemblance to my own. Two gaunt shapes stood before me that bore my face. They were ashen faced with dead eyes and grey skin. 

"Find the father and the mate." The Voices spoke with purpose, a trembling anger underneath their collective voice. "Tear them apart."

_No_! I suddenly cried at their intention. Although I could acknowledge the desire to see both Derek and my father hurt, I honestly did not want them to die, especially at my own hands. 

"When will you understand? We've heard your desire, and we are driven to grant it." The Voices replied as the two ashen bodies of me faded in waves in the air. "You are _not_ in control here anymore." 

As the copies of me vanished in the air, the Voices walked back to the living room and once again grabbed hold of the two unconscious forms below him. After the sight I had just witnessed and the thoughts I had been privy too, I knew exactly where our next destination would be. As we once again shifted in space and conveniently moved in a manner that was so unfamiliar to me, we quickly reappeared in a familiar looking cement hallway submerged in red light. The last time I had been here, I had severely wounded three men. Two of which were innocent. 

The Voices silently dragged the bodies of the two unconscious men beside him as we made our way down the shockingly deserted halls. Although, I quickly realized that this shouldn't have come as a surprise considering what I had done the day before. Then another thought quickly crossed my mind, a spark of hope that was quickly quashed by the Voices as they read my mind in real time. 

"No. We did not aid you in that time." The Voices replied as I wondered if they had taken control of my body before. I had wondered if perhaps it had been them who had done those things... "That was you. Quite frankly, we were impressed." 

_That doesn't mean much coming from you_. I mumbled in my mind. 

"Stop being a wilful fool. You've gained our respect despite your failures. You would take care not to lose it." 

We quietly made our way towards _that_ room that fateful day that I had lost control. The sigh of the two unconscious bodies being dragged down the astonishingly silent hallways with ease, gripped by their legs, was tremendously disconcerting. Still eerily quiet and devoid of any life, the red light of took on an even more sinister quality than it had before. The Voices themselves seemed to know exactly where to go. The moment the curious thought crossed my mind, they answered it with our arrival. 

It was still filled with the slings, toys, tables and mats as the lat time I had been here. It stank of stale piss and cum, and a heavy musk still clung in the air. The Voices wrinkled their nose in distaste and quickly made their way over the shelves lined with dildos. 

_He really hid it here_? I asked.

“Where else would you hide a mould of your own cock?” The Voices asked with disdain. “We have to say, we have existed for thousands of years but this certainly is a first. We had thought we were past being surprised. It’s rather nice to have been proven wrong, after so long. We are indeed certainly quite satisfied that we heeded your call.”

The Voices dragged and threw the bodies onto the filthy mat before they made their way towards the shelf of toys. I was both curious and impressed at how the Voices managed to sift through Ace's thoughts so quickly an efficiently.

“It was in a memory.” The Voices explained simply. "As are we." 

_I guess where better to hide a dildo Axis than in a sex club_? I replied sarcastically.

“What a curiously obscene creature he is.” The Voices said, and I couldn’t help but agree. 

_What are you going to do with this one_? I asked. 

"You'll see." The Voices whispered eagerly. 

They fetched the large cock mould and slowly stalked back towards Ace's unconscious form. The man's breaths were ragged and erratic, his clothes almost as torn as the skin on his body. The hand that had its nails torn still bled profusely, seemingly unable to coagulate despite his Were nature. For a moment, I wanted to pity him.

"I don't understand why you would." The voices muttered as they pulled Ace up by his neck. The Were started gasping for air desperately, his eyes still closed, as the Voices tightened their grip on his throat. "The living are such curious creatures. So... frail. The ᛋᛈᚨᚱᚲ is wasted on you. Curse you ᚷᛟᛞ ᛟᚠ ᛏᚺᛖ ᛚᛁᚷᚺᛏ."

As they spoke, I felt another surge of the power they had stolen from Deaton course through my veins. It began to push itself past Ace's skin and into his being, grabbing hold of something insubstantial and crucial to his life. This was something that I could not name, but I knew something that the Voices sought and aimed to take. 

"So ignorant." The Voices mumbled. I wondered at that time whether that had been meant for me, or for the man who's throat they had pierced. 

Slowly, I felt life draining from Ace's form. It travelled through the Voices stolen claws, through our bodies, and into the Axis they held in their hands. The more of it passed through my body, the more disturbed I became at what was being done. It felt wrong. Everything in my body that did not belong to the Voices cried out that it was wrong. I knew without knowing that this was unnatural and went against everything that I had learned. My spark rattled at the transmission of this essence from its holder to the object he had created. 

_Stop_. I stammered desperately as I easily lost composure at the unnatural pressure that suddenly filled my mind. 

I felt the smile on our face, the Voices face, widened as more of the essence moved from Ace to the axis, my body acting as the conduit for the transfer. Eventually I started to feel pain. The pain wasn't in my muscle or my bones, but in my soul. It started as a flutter in what I had always assigned as the source of my spark. The flutter quickly turned into a rattle, and now it had changed into a heavy, painful, pulsing that reverberated from my within my being to without, wracking everything in place as it moved along the way. 

_Stop_! I screamed desperately from within me, scratching a the whatever spark I could manage to enforce my will. But whatever the Voices were doing rattled my control, and all I could do was watch in horror as Ace's body started to slowly decompose. He was still alive, but hardly well. I knew that if this continued, the man would surely die. 

"A gift, for you." The Voices replied with a smile. "And for us." 

But just as they tightened their grip on Ace's throat, we found ourselves being flung against the hard, two-way mirror across the room. Ace's dildo-tail clatters to the ground as the blast rattled my body. I knew from the strength of it that it would have torn skin and broken bones if it were not for the presence of the Voices within me. But the Voices quickly recovered and I felt and heard their anger in my mind. 

As they looked up for the sign of the attack, they find a sweating, pale-faced Deaton with his hands suspended in mid air. He crawls over to Ace's body, placed his hands no his chest, and muttered something under his breath. 

"Druid. Do not test us." The Voices seethed as they moved onto their feet and quickly walked towards Deaton's muttering form. 

But just as they reached for the older man, still calmly speaking softly on the ground, five, sharp nails pierced onto our neck. A mighty pressure moved us back onto our feet and slowly started to pull us away. Below us, Deaton spares a quick glance up at our frozen form before he closed his eyes. 

"Stiles. You have to stop." Peter's voice sounded from behind us. 

Suddenly, I found myself falling into darkness once more. It was stifling. It wrapped itself around me like a snake stifling its prey. I felt myself being pulled apart and moved about helplessly like a rag doll caught in an undercurrent. By the time it had stopped, my mind was shaken with nausea from being thrown about. 

"Oh, fuck. I'm going to puke. I'm going to puke in my brain. Oh, that's not good. Puke shouldn't be in brains." I rambled as I tried to still my tumbling mind. 

"Just listen to my voice. Follow it. I'm here." Peter called out from within the darkness. 

"Peter?" I said weakly, still utterly confused at how I could feel nausea despite having no body. I was in my mind. I _was_ a mind. I was just thought. So going by everything that had happened, clearly I can be thought and body, or think that I have a body. Therefore, could I just be thinking that I have nausea and therefore I have, or am, nausea from the sheer act of thinking I have nausea? "Why am I here? Why can't I see you? Am I thinking or am I talking? Why am I nauseated? Where are you? What is this place? I'm pretty sure I peed my pants, but I'm also sure I don't have a dick. Or a body. What's happening? Oh fuck. I think I'm about to puke out Algebra." 

"You're thinking too much. Stop. Take a breath." Peter's voice said distantly. 

"Wait? Can my mind breathe?" I asked desperately, the idea of such a thing brought about another wave of nausea and breathing pains. 

"Think about something else." Peter offered form within the nothingness. 

"Like what?" I asked desperately trying to feel around for the ground with my non-existent hands. 

"Think about something that calms you down. Think about curly fries. Think about when you're driving your jeep down the interstate at night and you're not driving the speed limit for miles. Think about those stupid horror movies that you like. Or that stupid sci-fi show with that guy who has tentacles on his chin, that grey chick, and that guy who you have a crush on, but won't admit to, that wears too much leather and a lot of prosthetic." Peter explained. 

As I listened to his words, I slowly realized that he was right. My mind, or rather me, felt much clearer. I knew that I still had no control of my body, as could not feel it at all. But I also felt alone. I had tremendous confidence about the fact that my thoughts were finally my own. This confidence was enough to center myself as I had done before.

I thought of trees. I then held the picture in my mind, or in me, and looked for branches and painted images of leaves. I counted each leaf slowly and deliberately. I created a form, pictured a piece, and then counted all the other pieces. I traced each figure in the air and shaped it with my will. I gave it substance and scent and sound. It crunched underneath my feet as the ground slowly filled with thousands of leaves. They fell from branches attached to tall, ancient, trees. The leaves were blown into the air and onto the ground by a gentle breeze. It caressed my skin tenderly, and as I opened my eyes I saw the darkness had gone, and I was standing in the woods in twilight. 

"Where am I? Where are you?" I asked, still confused.

"We're still in between us. We're not in you and we're not in me." Peter replied as he suddenly appeared from thin air, materializing smoky wisps. 

"What did you do?" I asked suspiciously. "How did you get there? How were you able to sneak up on us? Are you even Peter? Is this another sex memory?" 

"Us? Sex memory?" Peter asked curiously before he shook his head. "What the hell happened? Deaton sent me a message. No words, just an image. It was here in the... dungeon." 

"Deaton sent you a message? How?" I asked, still confused. 

"I don't know everything Stiles. I just know he did. After you obliterated most of the apartment and disappeared with Ace and Deaton, most of us who were okay went looking for you." He explained. "Not that we knew where or even how to..." 

"Most of you who were okay? Who got hurt?" I asked with concern. 

Peter was quiet for a moment and studied me with even eyes before he spoke again with a quick shake of his head. "It was Lydia. She's fine! Don't panic. She's alright. She was the closest to you when you... she got thrown across the room and suffered a lot of broken bones and a concussion. But she got out of surgery okay."

I closed my eyes and tried not to panic as tremendous guilt and shame washed over me. But Peter quickly dived forward, grabbed me by the shoulders, and shook me hard. 

"Stop it. It's fine. You can take it. I figured so many people have lied to you enough the past week that I figured you could take this. Don't make me be wrong." He said angrily. "We had split up trying to look for you when I got that message from Deaton. I got here as fast as I could and then I just followed your scent through the building. I saw Deaton throw you across the room. Then when you stalked towards him, I rushed forward and... well..." Peter moved his right hand and flashed his claws. But I knew those weren't his own. I had seen them before. They were Talia's claws. 

"You shoved your dead sister's claws in my fucking neck?" I asked with shock. "Are you fucking crazy? You could paralyze me! Or necrotising fasciitis!"

"You won't get necrotising fasciitis." Peter replied impatiently. 

"I can too! I don't know where, or who, else that claw's been in!" I bit back. "Fuck, I could get herpes." 

"If you got herpes, it wouldn't be from me. Probably from your whore of a husband who started this whole thing in the first place." He snarked. 

"Oh, I am going to kill you if I get herpes or die." I replied seriously. 

"There weren't really a lot of alternatives at the time. Usually this is the point where you say thank you." He replied dryly before he narrowed his eyes. "Actually this is the part where you tell me what the fuck is going on?" 

"You tell me, 'cause apparently you've done this a lot. Just how many times have you used those damn things?" I asked as I eyed him suspiciously. "I know you used it at the club. Who else?"

" _Really_ not the time to be asking questions you should have asked earlier." Peter said evenly. 

"Well I don't know why I didn't ask before and I'm asking them now." I said stubbornly.

"You also blew up half of an apartment building after causing an earthquake and kidnapped two people, both of whom look bloodied and dying." Peter replied angrily. "So tell me what. The fuck. Is going. On." 

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Possessed again. Ancient evil, blah, blah, blah. I think I summoned it." I waved Peter off as he tried to interrupt my poor explanation and trudged on. "I think it's kinda like Noshikos' nogitsune but I might have gone a bit Darach at that time when I did it, so it summoned something like it but different. I might have mixed the two, at the same time? I guess this is what came out? Or I helped it come out and now it's tied to me. It's old. It's a lot of... things? It speaks in plural anyway. And it's really old. Did I say that already? It's powerful. It knows magic I've never heard of or seen. I mean, it can teleport! And not the kind that burns you into ash, or requires insects, or thunder like the Riders, or through black smoke like the Onis. It's fucking weird."

"Stiles..." Peter tried to interrupt. 

"And it can go into people's minds. Like you. But like it used Ace's claws, which is really weird cause Ace isn't an alpha. At least I don't think so. But they did things with it that I think only Talia ever did. Well as far as I know we've only ever tried it with Talias claws. Or well, maybe I don't think Talia ever did those from what I've read in her diaries. But she lied a lot. A Hale's a Hale I guess. You know what? It's probably way better than Talia. It can enter and move through memories like we're fucking LARPing."

"Stiles..." Peter tried to interrupt again, his face looking tired and frustrated. 

"And it says words I've never heard of, but sounds a bit Germanic, and shit just happens. It's old fucking magic I've never seen or heard of before. It's doing this thing with an Axis Mundi he got from Ace. Oh! Shit! It made copies of me! Ace stole my mating book and turned it into one of his tails. The Voices, that's what I call them, is using Ace's tails as an axis of power. They made doppleganger Stileses that look kinda like zombies! And..."

"Stiles, please," Peter stepped forward and tried once more to catch my attention. 

"... it's weird, but like I feel different right now. Why is that? Like I hate Derek and want to kick his ass, but I'm not gonna kill him. I mean, I can make it hurt. For a long time, right? Wait, I think I can kill him. But I know I shouldn't and probably won't. But I could. I mean, Chris showed me lots of ways that would make a Werewolf hurt. Especially a cheating bastard of a Wolf. But I remember everything and it all felt heightened at the time. The lust, the pain, the fear, the loneliness, the anger, the loss of hope. It was all there and I was lost in my head so much that I can't even keep it straight right now. Do you think the Voices had something to do with that? Or do you think it was Ace? Like he pulls strings, Peter! Strings of fate! It's like fucking anime. But not really and way more slutty but with far less tentacles. Maybe more like smutty but less hairy Beast Stars? He kinda seduced Derek, but not really brainwashing, I don't think. Like I think Derek still did those things out of his own free will, but like Ace _really_ influenced him to do it with this like..."

"Stiles!" Peter yelled at my face as he grabbed me by my makeshift shoulders and shook me in place. "Stop! Too much information."

"Well it _is_ a lot, okay?" I snapped back. "One moment I'm just trying to survive after being cheated on by my _husband_ , and the next thing I know I've unleashed an ancient dark force with an earthquake, almost blew up one of my best friends, and now an primeval evil's about to go on a killing spree with Goth clones of me. And I thought my biggest problem was getting turned on by seeing my husband get fucked. Think we can get back to that?" 

"What does it want to do?" Peter asked seriously, ignoring my latter question to my relief. It had likely been a joke. Probably. 

"Well, it broke Ace's youngest tail and made two of me, like I said. Doppelganger Stileses." I pointed out. "They look like Adams family rejects."

"You said a lot of things. Too much." Peter snapped back. "What is he doing with them? Where are they? Youngest tail? There's another one? What is he going to do with it?"

"It's 'them' and 'they'. Pretty sure they identify with gender neutral plural pronouns." I replied. 

"Are you kidding me right now?" Peter asked exasperatedly. "What's he... they, planning to do now?"

"How the hell should I know? A lot of stuff happened. I was in my head and there were a lot of voices and it was mostly them. It was hard to tell sometimes which ones were mine and which ones were them. I wasn't even sure if I was doing and thinking things that were my own thoughts and actions or if it was them. I didn't know where they started and where I ended. I couldn't tell us apart. Sometimes I thought they _were_ me." I frowned seriously as I tried to remember the sensation of trying to exist through the cacophony of voices. "And we kept on jumping from one memory to another, it was fucking surreal. I mean I was Ace at one point and I fucked Derek! Fuck, I really need a scalding, hot, shower after this. I feel gross."

Peter suddenly stiffened and snapped his head up and glowered at something beyond the tree leaves. He began to look about himself in a panic when suddenly his eyes glowed their electric blue and he roared into the distance. 

"What? What's happening?" I asked, confused. 

"Fuck. I thought we'd have more time. But believe it or not, I'm not an expert in moving different egos across multiple bodies." He said bitterly. 

"Actually, yeah. How _did_ you do that? I couldn't tell us apart, but _you_ somehow did? With your sister's nails. How did you do this Peter?" I asked with narrowed eyes before I stepped back. "Are you even Peter?"

"We don't have fucking time for this." He snapped. "We should because time _should_ be relative here, but apparently we don't. I managed to tear you away and now they're coming back." 

Thunder rumbled in the distance. Our eyes swept across the horizon it had come from and saw thick, black, ominous clouds. 

"We're still connected." Peter replied vaguely.

"Seriously. _How_ did you do that? Did you... tear me away from my own mind? So you left that thing in my own body, unsupervised?" I asked with shock. 

"No. I shuffled him into _my_ mind." Peter replied with another snarl at the distant dark clouds. Slowly, the sky above us began to darken even further and the wind carried with it a stinging chill amongst a thunderous crash.

"You what?" I exclaimed, trying to yell over the sudden din. "You put an ancient evil in your fucked up head? Peter, you don't put ancient powerful beings in _your_ own evil head." 

Peter narrowed his eyes at my words and barked back an angry response. "You're one to talk." 

"I didn't mean to be possessed! I didn't spread my legs and go, 'have at it Johnny!'. _You_ did it on purpose." I spat back. 

"To save you!" Peter retorted angrily. 

"How though? Really, just how often have you been using Talia's claws?" I asked again. 

"I've had practice." He snapped. "This really isn't the time to be having this conversation." 

"No. It isn't." The Voices replied calmly beside us, having appeared out of thin air. 

Somehow, they looked different and warped. Countless eyes and mouths lined every inch of spare skin on a body that vaguely resembled mine. Each mouth seemed to move of its own accord, while every eye that we could see were trained on us. I stumbled back in surprise and gazed at the creature in awe and fear.

"You kinda look like that thing from a Power Rangers episode." Were the first words out of my mouth after the Voices' arrival. 

Peter threw an exasperated expression in my direction while the creature just tilted its head in curiosity. Suddenly, the Voices snapped their arms up, which were also lined with mouths and eyes, and grabbed Peter by the throat. It turned its face (?) towards Peter and spoke in my voice. 

"What a curious mind you have. Broken and burning with unremarkable rage. If only you could see ours and survive it." The mouths throughout its body said in turn with each word to Peter. It turned to face (?) me and slowly walked forward with Peter in tow in their hand. "Do you still want your justice? Do you still yearn for your peace?" 

"Justice? My peace? You mean kill Ace, my dad, and Derek?" I asked as I moved back onto my feet, fully aware what the creature had meant.

"So small minded." They replied as many of the mouths laughed in response . "You can truly only find peace when everything else is gone. What else do you have left to hold on to?"

"My friends. My pack. My family." I replied with as much firm resolve as I could muster. 

"Friends? Pack? Family?" The Voices laughed again, the mouths rang with laughter as many of the eyes moved their irises about, some streaming tears down their corners. "They _were_ your friends, pack, and family. Ignorance is bliss we suppose. We shall remedy that for you."

"No thanks. I'm good." I replied quickly and forcefully as Peter struggled in the creature's arms It seemed totally unfazed as the older man tried everything he could to free himself. I doubt the thing even felt Peter clawing, punching, and kicking at the countless eyes on its body. 

"You would trust in the blood of the mate who betrayed you? You would spare the creature that defiled your home and your wills? You would forgive the man that's both father and traitor?" They asked mockingly. 

"No. Not really. I don't know. But I can think of something. By myself." I insisted. "Thanks."

"With me, we can turn that pain into power." They replied. 

"I don't need your kind of power." I said in response. 

"But you would ask for this one's?" They asked mischievously. "We suppose it is because you are ignorant of their betrayal."

"What?" I asked, surprised by their statement. 

"Stiles..." Peter croaked as he struggled in the Voice's hand.

"We shall show you." They said simply before the world shifted once more. 

To my horror, I was once again swept away into another memory.

I stood outside Peter's loft, my phone still clutched in my fist. I was broken and angry, furious tears still streamed down my face. I spared one more glance at the phone in my fist before forcing my way inside the older man's home. 

"Why do I never lock that door?" Peter asked the moment I had marched inside. He was dressed casually in sweats and a t-shirt, reading a paperback next to a lit fireplace. "Shouldn't you be at Scott's having a party without me? Or did you come here to explicitly gloat about your happiness. You know..."

His words stopped as he took in my wet, red, face. He sniffed the air and smelled the anger and the pain that leaked off me. He studied me quietly and waited for me to speak first. 

After some time trying to organize my thoughts, I spoke the first thing that came to mind. "A fucking butt dial."

"What?" Peter asked curiously, having thrown the book carelessly aside and had instead opted to study me quietly while I tried to sort my mind.

"My dad fucking butt dialed me." I said again angrily, but my voice had wobbled and it sounded broken instead. "Lydia and Scott were inside. I took the call outside. I didn't hear anything at first. Just Scott and Lydia laughing inside the house. So I moved away so I could hear better until I couldn't hear them laughing anymore . Then I heard them talking..."

"Scott and Lydia?" Peter asked, confused. 

"My dad and... Derek." I said with far more dreadful calm than it deserved. 

"I see." Peter asked. 

"We were talking about stupid stuff. We were getting drunk. Scott even got some Jimsoonweed shit from Deaton to get wasted. Lydia was already out of it. I drank a lot, you know? I needed it." I explained as I flinched at the memory of why I had needed it. "Did you know about this whole Were marriage bullshit? I thought it was just... you know. It's not legal. But fucking Deaton gave me this fucking book. We're supposed to be bound? What the fuck? We can _die_ together? I mean. I was thinking... I was freaking out. For a bit."

"Stiles..." Peter began, trying to interrupt my rant. 

"But I quickly figured, like I always do, that we've already almost died for each other. _Many_ times. So, what's committing to that for life?" I said angrily. "He said that he... I love him. You know? I do. Fuck. I do. Of course I do. That's why I said yes when he asked. He fucking _asked_. I didn't do it. He did. That means he loves me. I know he does. He fucking does. Right? But he fucks my father? _Is_ fucking my father? What the hell? What... I can't... I don't... who does that?"

Peter remained quiet and just watched me with an impassive face, apparently unable to speak the train of thought he had began to say. 

"Seriously? Before we're supposed to get Were married. I mean, I convinced myself that I could. All that shit in the book. All the possible ways I could tear my soul and my mind apart for him. And the fucking boils. I mean boils? What the hell. Who fucking decides this? We break up after mating and we can get boils on our asses?" I said distastefully. 

Distantly I heard a clock ticking in the background on top of the crackling of the fire. I stood there, staring at Peter trying to sort my confused and pained thoughts. 

"What do you want?" Peter asked. 

"I..." I had just asked myself that question and I hadn't come up with an answer. "I don't want boils." 

"Right now. What do you want?" Peter asked once again. 

"I don't want to hurt." I confessed to the fire. "I want to hurt them." 

"Alright." Peter answered simply before he moved to his feet. 

I watched him slowly as he moved towards me, his eyes never strayed from holding my own. His movements were astonishingly controlled and quiet that he had reached me quite quickly. He stood before me, just looking into my eyes, caressing my face with his breath. 

"Whiskey?" I asked, recognizing scents of alcohol in his exhalation.

"Want a taste?" He asked quietly as he studied my eyes. I wondered what he saw in them. "Helps numb the pain."

"Yes." The reply had barely left my lips before the older man dove in and kissed me passionately. Our tongues wrestled in our mouths as I grabbed hold of the life line he was giving me. This act was a salvation from the bog of my own present misery. I wholeheartedly jumped into it. 

We moved as we kissed. Furniture and coffee tables toppled to the ground. Our passion, and my desperation for a distraction, moved us around. At on point, he picked me up in his arms, my legs wound around his waist, and moved us up a flight of stairs. Then in between deep, lustful kisses full of dancing tongues and moans, we found ourselves on a bed. Briefly, I spared a second for a realization that I had hardly thought of Derek and my father's betrayal while we had kissed. I yearned for that ignorance for another moment. So I dove back into Peter's arms. 

Peter's scent was different from Derek's. It was deeper, muskier, and far heavier. It clung to his skin like molasses, almost sickly sweet to my senses yet so intoxicating. I rubbed my cheek against the stubble of his jaw before I made my way down his neck. I licked and nipped lightly at the skin while taking deep breaths. I shuddered with ecstasy as I took in a lungful of his musk into me. Distantly, I heard the rumbling in his chest grow louder every time I bit into his skin, the loudest of which had been the ones where I had left teeth marks on the surface. I massaged his large pecs, admiring the musculature up close of what I had only been able to do from afar. I sucked in a nipple into my mouth until the nub grew long and hard. I bit it lightly with my front teeth and Peter growled loudly in response, his hands darted up to press my head closer against his chest. 

My left hand traveled down his chest, tucking it under the waistband of his sweats. It wasn't a surprise to find that he had groomed his crotch, barely feeling hair on his pelvis. It was a pleasure to find that he was at full mast, hard and leaking at my ministrations. I pulled his hard cock up from the angle it had been pressed down on at his sides, and slowly studied the mass with my hand. It was hard and hot, yet the skin was so velvety smooth. I pulled up on the shaft until I reached the rosy, pink head and was surprised to find a significant amount of foreskin at the tip. I fished the cock out of his sweats and moved up to look at it. 

"You have a lot of foreskin." I pointed out as I stretched it up and over his cock head. From this angle, his cock looked even more intimidating. Although the length of his cock was similar to Derek's in size, it was clearly thicker with far more heft. Below them were large, low hanging, well groomed, balls that were a darker colour than the rest of his skin. 

"Is that a problem?" He asked breathlessly as his hand stroked my hair. 

"No. I've just never seen it that long before. Derek's uncut too, but his isn't that long." I explained while playing with it with my fingers. 

He leaned up briefly and pulled his pants off before he leaned back against the headboard, his hands behind his head, smirking down at me. "Well, why don't you go take a closer look?" 

Doing as I was told, I made my way down to his crotch and used both hands to study his thick, hard, cock. I took my time. I stroked his shaft all the way down and was mesmerized by the fact that it still didn't manage to pull the skin down past the head. I had to use my other hand to do so. I then stretched it back up and tried to see just how far it would go and stretched it to its limits, eliciting an obscene groan from Peter. I leaned closer to it and took the skin into my mouth. I tasted a strong mixture of sweat, piss, and other things from his unwashed cock. Yet, I didn't find it unpleasant. In fact, I found it intoxicating. 

"You taste good." I found myself saying out loud after I finished nibbling and lapping at his foreskin skin. "Actually, you smell good." 

At that declaration, I moved all the way down and buried my nose into his balls. The musk was the strongest there, and each deep, breath filled my head up and made me dizzy in a pleasant way. It was addictive. 

"You smell really good." I repeated, before I started to lick and lap at his sack. 

"You think I smell good? Fuck, Stiles. You don't know what saying that means to a Werewolf." He replied lustfully before he grabbed my legs and quickly, to my surprise, pulled me into a sixty-nine position and fished my cock and balls out of my pants. "Meanwhile, you smell so fucking delicious." 

With surprising ease, he bobbed up to catch my hard cock with his mouth and sucked it deep into his throat. My legs almost gave way from the sensation, but his hands kept a solid grip on my hips, keeping me in place. He took a long, hard, suck of my cock until it popped out of his mouth before he craned his neck up to bury his face in my balls. 

"Oh fuck, Peter!" I gasped a I felt his tongue bathe my scrotum while his rapid breaths tickled my pubic hair. 

"You smell good. You taste good." He said lustfully with a deep growl. His voice had changed in the meantime. It had grown far more hoarse and lower than I had ever heard it before. At one point he even managed to take both of my cock and my balls into his mouth. He somehow even managed to massaged all of them with his tongue while I was inside him. 

Not to be outdone, I dove back into his crotch and took his mast into my mouth. It stretched my lips to its limit, and I did my best to move my tongue along his glans and the top of his shaft. With one hand, I grabbed his balls and squeezed and pulled at the weight of them, causing the older were to rumble lustfully with my junk in his mouth. The vibration almost sent me over the edge and his cock popped out of my mouth as I cursed from the pleasure of it. When I had looked back at his cock, the older man was leaking out a copious amount of precum. 

"Fuck, you're leaking so much." I whispered, mesmerize by the sheer volume of it. "You're not actually already cumming, are you?" 

"No." He replied with a raspy voice. "Precum." 

At the response, I leaned down and licked the streaming liquid, fully expecting to be bombarded by the taste of a mouthful of salt. Instead, it was much lighter than I had expected. It was far less bitter and less salty than Derek's load. 

"It tastes better." I said with surprise. "You taste better than Derek."

"Stiles, what are you doing to me?" The older man asked as I took his cock back into my mouth and drank down the liquid that leaked out. 

"I wonder what your cum tastes like." I said absentmindedly in between licks. I squeezed Peter's cock hard, stroking up on the shaft to force more of the pre-cum to ooze out. 

"You'll find out in a bit." He said with a low growl before diving back into my crotch.

"No." I replied, shaking my head and moving over to the side. My cocks falls out of Peter's mouth an obscene pop. Peter looks at me with surprise.

"No?" He asked, with a curious brow. "We've gotten a bit far, don't you think?"

"Yeah. That's why," I replied as my voice trailed off. 

"Why, what?" He asked again.

"That's why I want you to fuck me. I want you to cum in me instead." I replied to Peter's surprise. "I want you to breed me, Peter." 

Peter closed his eyes slowly before he pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingers. "That damn obscene mouth of yours. You don't know what you're asking." 

"I do." I insisted as I crawled towards him and straddled his body. I pushed him back against the headboard and leaned in for a kiss. I pressed against his moist lips and lightly parted them with my tongue. He leaned back into the kiss and met my tongue with his own. I kissed my way up his cheek and leaned into his ear. "Fuck me, Peter. I want you to breed me."

"You know you're engaged to my nephew?" He said teasingly at the most inopportune time. 

"So? He already fucked me tonight. You saying you don't want to?" I asked. "Fuck me." 

He growled at my words, grabbed my body tightly and flipped me over onto my back. In short order, he had shredded my remaining clothes off of my body. 

"You won't have to ask me thrice." He growled before diving down and shoved his tongue into my ass. "And I don't really care that you asked." 

"Holy shit! What are you doing?" I asked with surprise as I felt the wet sensation of his tongue being forcefully shoved into my hole. It was new and surprisingly... pleasurable. 

"Opening you up to take my cock." He replied simply before continuing his ministrations on my ass. 

"No!" I exclaimed as I pulled myself away from the memory. Around us, the Voices laughed as soon as the scenery faded. 

"This is a lie!" Peter snarled as he extracted himself with tremendous effort from the memory. It looked liked his skin stretched and tore, as if he had truly pulled himself apart. 

"You can't run away from the truth of things." The Voices purred before it poured more of its will into us and pushed us back into the memory.

The feeling of being dragged back into quicksand arrived and faded quickly, suddenly replaced by the sensations that the memory offered. 

Peter was grinding against me, pushing his thick cock deeper into me with every thrust. Our combined moans echoed throughout the space. Each thrust touched that little part deep inside of me that sent shivers up my spine. I wrapped my legs around his ribs as he leaned deeper into my body. He began to pound harder and pulled his cock out almost to the tip only to ram it back deep into my guts. I moaned aloud with every thrust and relished the weight of him on top of me. 

"You're so beautiful." He growled as he watched me squirm beneath him. I found it difficult to keep my eyes open from the overwhelming pleasure that wracked my body. In comparison, Peter seemed to enjoy watching me squirm underneath him. "You're so fucking tight."

"You're so fucking thick." I moaned obscenely as I started thrusting my hips upwards to meet his cock. 

"You wanted me to fill you up?" He asked after a particularly hard thrust. 

"Yes." I groaned as the thrust sent another sharp tingle up my spine. 

"Want me to breed you?" He asked again.

"Yes." I insisted as I dug my nails deeper into his shoulders. 

"Fuck, Stiles!" He exclaimed as his thrusts faltered. Suddenly, as I began to feel something growing inside of my ass, Peter bit into my shoulder .

"Oh, fuck!" I exclaimed with my release, overwhelmed by the sensation of one particularly hard thrust, the growing pressure in my ass, and the sensation of Peter's fangs piercing the skin on my shoulder. I had expected pain from the act, but instead there was a nothing but a warm feeling that began to spread from my shoulder and my ass. Soon, the pressure in my began to fill my senses and I was suddenly all too aware at how large it was. It also seemed to keep getting larger. 

"Shit, Peter. What the hell is that?" I asked with a tinge of panic as the pressure in my ass continued to build. Suddenly, I felt something else. I felt a pulsing in my ass and another kind of pressure that like I was... "Oh fuck. How can I feel you cumming in me? And why is there so much? Shit, what is that?"

Peter just growled at my questions as he seemingly refused to remove his jaw and his fangs from my shoulder. Instead, he just kept a tighter hold on me and even thrust his cock deeper, if it were possible, into me. It took for a moment for the realization to click in place. I had never thought it was possible, and had only ever dismissed the possibility of it as being ridiculous. But I could not deny the fact before me. I tried to move out of his Peter's grasp, inching out to dislodge our hips apart. But a sudden large pressure pressed into my prostate just as Peter growled and bit deeper into my shoulder, holding me tighter against his body, and stopped me from moving. The warm, fluttering, sensations in me began to spread as I realized this was the feeling of Peter filling me up with his cum. He was breeding me, just as I had requested. 

"Are you... is this the knot? Werewolves really do fucking knot?" I exclaimed at the realization of it as Peter growled again just as he emptied more of his cum inside of me. "Peter, stop!" 

But he didn't listen. Instead the rumbling in his chest deepened. 

"Peter, stop!" I exclaimed, trying to push his weight off of my body. I tried shifting again, but as soon as I jostled the knot inside of me, Peter just tightened his grip and kept my body in place. "Stop!"

With tremendous effort in an uncomfortable position, I punched him as hard as I could in the side of his head. It took three strikes before Peter dislodged his fanged jaws off of my bleeding shoulder, the pain of which suddenly shot through me. I worked to ignore it and instead tried to punch him again. But Peter took hold of both my hands with his own and held them in place before he roared into my face. I tried to gather my spark but found that I couldn't reach it. It was still there, I could feel it, but it sputtered out of existence before I could coalesce it into something meaningful. 

"Stop. Please." I said angrily at the man who had roared in my face. 

"You wanted this." He growled. "You begged for it."

"Not like this. I didn't know. I thought..." I began, thinking of a thousand excuses for the act. I was angry. I was hurt. It was Derek's fault. He was fucking my father. I thought he was joking about the knotting. I didn't know Peter could do it. 

I was hurt. 

It hurt.

Then why was this feeling better? 

That damn mating manual even seemed so ridiculous and absurd with its unusually striking portents of tying fates into a knot. I thought it had been poetry, that it had been exaggerated sophistry to emphasize the weight of a Were marriage and discourage separations. I had not expected literal knots. Now everything else in it weighted on my mind. Were everything else true? Wouldn't a one sided break into our bonds tear our souls? 

"You begged me to breed you." He growled close to my ear, ignoring the small tears that peeked out from the corners of my eyes. "You wanted it. You still want it." 

"No!" I exclaimed and tried to struggle out of his grasp. But he just tightened his grip instead and growled once again in my ear.

"You like me breeding you. I can fucking smell it." He replied, snuffling against my neck. "I'm breeding you. Filling you up. Fill you up with my pups." 

"Stop." I whispered in a broken voice as my cock began to leak from the pleasure of the pressure in me. Peter moved his hand down slowly before grabbing hold of it and jacked me off in slow, hard, strokes. "Stop." 

"You're mine. Make you smell like mine. Fill you up. Put pups in you." He growled in a low, sensual, voice. "Fucking mate. Fuck. Fill you with puppies. So good. Taking knot. Tight mate. Mine." 

"Peter..." I whispered as he jacked me off over the edge and I released my seed between us. Peter buried his face deep into my neck and breathed in deeply as I coated our bodies with my cum. Slowly, he let go of my arms and I brought them around him, pulling his body deeper into mine. 

"Mine!" He rumbled deeply with another thrust of his hips, emphasizing the sizeable knot inside of me. He began to lick the wound on my shoulder as I closed my eyes and focused on losing myself to all the sensations that wracked my body. 

"Yours." I whispered into his ear as I was overwhelmed by the dark. 

"This is a lie!" I exclaimed the moment I was pushed out of the memory and stumbled onto the makeshift ground. There was no ground. This was just in the mind. Was there truth? This had to have been a lie. I had no memory of it after all.

"A fucking lie!" Peter echoed in a roar, to my surprise. He leaped at the Voices that bore my face who just laughed and vanished in place and reappeared not far away. 

"You lie to yourselves." The Voices all laughed in a round, their taunts echoed throughout this space. 

"I know my own mind!" Peter roared, his eyes a blazing blue as he glowered at the creature.

The scene suddenly shifted again, and once more we were pulled into the memories of our own bodies. 

"I told you to fucking let me go." I roared, punching the older man with a hard, spark filled, blow. The strike staggered him back onto the wall and tore the skin at the corner of his lips. "You fucking Hales." 

"You asked me." He growled. " _You_ asked me too. You wanted it. I heard it in your voice. I fucking smelled it." 

"Then pay attention to the fucking words! I said stop!" I yelled back in equal anger. "This can't be fucking happening. What the fuck did I do?"

" _You_? He cheated on you with your father the night before your fucking wedding." He glowered. "What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Maybe I was wrong. It can't be right. I just... I just heard it. I didn't actually see it. Fuck!" I screamed at the air. "What did I do? What did _I_ do? What did you fucking do to me? I'm getting married tomorrow."

"You're _mine_." He roared, pouncing onto me which caused us to crash onto the ground. " _He_ doesn't deserve a mate like you. You're mine!" 

"I'm nobody's." I spat in his face. "My dad wouldn't do that to me. It doesn't fucking make sense. It's something else. Something magical. Or some fucking illusion. Or it's all in my head. Or they're being controlled. Or, it's you."

"What?" He growled in my face with narrowed eyes. "What did you just fucking say?"

"You did something. A fucking spell. Or, something." I insisted madly. "You did something. You always do."

He lowered his face close to mine, his eyes flashing a bright blue. "You want to know what I did?"

"I knew it! I knew you did something." I sneered frantically before I spat onto his face. "Trash will always be trash." 

He wiped his face of my spit with disgust before he returned my sneer in equal measure. He then smiled dryly down at me.

"After _everything_ I've done for you, you're still an annoying little shit. Why do I have to put up with you? Why does it have to be you?" I sneered again. 

"You've done _nothing_ for me." I yelled back against his words. 

"You think your father recovered on his own after that Berserker attack, you little shit?" He replied. 

"That was Melissa and Dr. Geyer you asshole. Of course you would take credit for someone else's work. All you fucking life." I spat. 

"What's a Berserker, Stiles?" He asked condescendingly.

"What?" I asked confused by the question. 

"Your father was attacked by a Berserker. You didn't even bother finding out what they really are." He sneered again. 

"I know what they are you asshole." I replied defiantly. 

"Then you know that Berserkers are creatures of broken memories, stripped of humanity. They are heightened base instincts of anger and rage, having been stripped of everything else that would temper those emotions. You think your little humpty dumpty dad was put together again only by a human doctor?" He explained with narrowed eyes.

"What? What're you talking about?" I asked, confused by his explanation. 

"His human side was _dying_ , Stiles." He explained. "Do you think it's easy stitching memories and emotions back in place as they're broken down and stripped from the base? Why do you think you kept hearing your father's voice when he was unconscious? Why do you think you kept seeing memories while he was wounded and asleep? He was calling out for you to help. And what did you do?"

"I... we found Noah. That Noah Patrick kid, remember? That's how I found out it was his bones that was inside..." I stammered as I tried to recall the memories while being distracted by the weight of Peter's words and his body. 

"Why didn't you go to Deaton?" He pressed. "You didn't even have to ask. _I_ was there. I put your father back together again, you ungrateful little shit. I stitched back together all the broken things that made him your father. You don't even know what using my sister's claws does to me. But I still did it for you." 

"You're lying." I replied, shaking my head at his words .

"I put Dudley Do Right back together for you and you still chose my nephew. He doesn't deserve you. You're _mine_." He growled. 

The Voices laughed as I screamed my fury out of me. "Fuck you!" 

Peter was blown against the far of the room, the force from my spark throwing him back and slammed him against the wall, cracking the wood and paint. Peter quickly recovers with sparkling blue eyes and roared into my face. Then the scene shifted as our fighting, grappling figures sparked and blurred. The next scene we lived was us, bloodied and torn, kissing atop the shredded bed. I was pulling Peter deeper into myself before he growled and flipped me over, pulled my hips upwards while pushing my shoulders down, and mounted me from behind. The scenes shifted once more and the motions of our fucking changed into another fight in Peter's living room. I stabbed him with a letter opener as he threw me, hard, into the couch in response. The scene shifted again as our bodies morphed, changed, and moved into a scene where I rode Peter on that torn, blood-stained, couch. My body bounced up and down as I massaged his hard cock with my ass, moaning every time the cock hit my prostate whenever I sat down. I gripped Peter's neck tightly as he feverishly jacked my hard cock. The scene shifted again, but this time we changed into a calmer scene than the others. I sat atop Peter's lap, knotted in place once again. It still surprised me that I could actually feel him pumping his seed into me. Peter was snuffling and licking the fresh wound he had bit into my shoulder. 

"I can't do this." I whispered against his hair. "God. I keep getting fucked tonight. Derek did it. You. Dammit. I'm doing it to myself. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck. I can't do this." 

"Oh, I dunno. You're quite good at it." He replied sleepily with another lick of the wound. 

"We can't do this." I whispered again. 

"I want to." He replied quietly. 

"We can't." 

"Why not?" He asked while softly kissing my elbow, watching the torn skin stitch itself back together with surprising speed. 

"I can't see the bruises." I replied as I grabbed onto a stray train of thought. 

"It's because we're connected. I heal. You heal." He explained. "We're tied together now. You're mine. I'm yours." 

"That's not right." I replied, shaking my head. "The book says... there wasn't a run. There wasn't..."

"I've been chasing you since I've met you." He replied calmly. "You chased after me too."

"I've tried to kill you. I've succeeded. I don't... love you." I confessed. 

"You do. You just think you don't, but you do. You'll find out later. I can wait." He insisted while taking deep, meaningful breaths against my neck. "You don't know it, but you smell content. You smell better than you ever have been with Derek. You want to be tied to me."

"I don't want to be." I confessed honestly. Peter's body stills in my arms as I suspect he heard the truth in my words. 

"Like I said, you'll find out later." He insisted. 

"I don't want it now." I insisted in turn. "I don't want to be tied to a broken man. Especially after I've just been broken by your... by Derek. I don't know what I want to do. But I know I don't want this." 

"Why? I could make you happy. I can." He insists against my skin, as if he were etching the promise onto my body.

"I want to be happy. But not with you. Not with Derek. Not anymore." I replied tiredly. "I want something else that's not any of you." 

"Don't say that." He pleaded into my skin. 

"I don't really like myself right now. So, I don't know how to love anyone, including you." I whispered tiredly into the older man's neck. "I don't want this." 

"What about what I want?" He asked. "I... love you." 

"It hurts too much." 

"Isn't a little agony worth it?"

"...no." 

Slowly, I was peeled away from the memory-body, stretching and shaping back into myself, I stood next to the Voice as we watched over the scene. I watched as Peter slowly reached to the table next to the couch, pulled open the drawer, and withdrew a small, wooden, case.

"I can make you forget." He whispered into my ear as he opened the case and studied its contents. 

"Can you?" My memory-body whispered into his neck. "Can you make me stop loving Derek? Make me stop... feeling this for you?"

"Yes." Peter whispered sadly while attaching long, sharp, nails into his own fingers.

The memory before us warped and shifted into nothingness the moment the nails pierced my skin. Then it flashed again, but instead the Voices and my form stood in place as the world shifted around us. The memories reformed in stable forms and shapes from a blur of colour. We were dragged along, as if we hovered over the ground, as Peter carried my body from his bed to his bathroom. He lay me down inside his large bath that was filled with flowers, leaves, and broken pieces of wood. The mixture was still clear, but tinted with an odd, light blue hue. He slowly submerged my most of my unconscious body into the watery concoction, save from the shoulders up. He stared at the bite marks he had made on my shoulder for a second before lightly caressing it with his fingers. Then taking hold of the back of my head, he slowly submerged the rest of my body in the mixture. My unconscious face was impassive, peacefully asleep, as I disappeared in the blue brew. 

The memories pulled us again and we found ourselves standing beside Peter's car, not far from my house in Beacon Hills. My unconscious body sat in the passenger seat while Peter sat quietly on the driver's side, studying the empty streets. Suddenly, I saw Derek leave my house, get into his car, and drive away. The moment he had gone, Peter gets out of the car and carries my unconscious body to the side of the house. He effortlessly climbs the side of the house and made his way onto the roof with my sleeping body in his arms. He opened the window slowly and made his way in to rest my body in my bed. I knew even without the courtesy of Peters memories that my clothes had been laundered, and that the concoction he had used on my body had washed all the scents of our time together. My eyes followed Peter's gaze and I was surprised to find that the bite marks he had left on my skin, at the crook of my neck and shoulders, had disappeared. Peter's hand twitched for a moment as if he were to reach for that spot, but had thought better of it. Then as he stood up and walked back to the window, the scene shifted again. 

The next time we found ourselves back in Peter's loft, in his dimly lit bedroom. The space was still a mess from our sex. Peter sat on his table, writing something on a piece of paper. It was a quick, simple sentence that he had clearly written for himself. 

_It's better to forget_. - _Peter Hale_. 

He calmly placed the pen atop the piece of paper before reaching over and opening a small, wooden, box. He took the things inside and attached them to his fingers. He looked up and stared into his eyes in the mirror. They flashed blue for a moment as he slowly brought his own hand against the back of his neck. He took three, fast breaths, before his face contorted in pain as he dug the nail into his own skin. He gritted his teeth as his body started to spasm and blood began to pour out from his pierced skin. As he dug the nails deeper into the flesh, Peter let out a pained, blood-curdling scream. Then the scene faded just as the memories did. 

I watched awe-struck as Peter's mind-form detached himself from the memory and the Voices moved closer to me to whisper in my ear. 

"He took your mind after he took you first. Well," the Voices chuckled. It was an odd, echoing, mocking, small bits of laughter that filled the space. "As much as something can be taken when it was so freely given." 

"You!" I threw at Peter's direction the moment he separated himself from the memory. "This entire time. What was that? Did you... did you just..."

As I stammered to articulate the words, Peter stared quietly at his hands. The Voices laughed at us both. 

"Excuse me but it looked as if you went to _me_. I didn't call you. I didn't force you to do anything. You _begged_ me to fucking breed you." He replied angrily. "There's no fucking moral high ground when you fucking begged for it." 

"I told you to stop." I insisted, the forgotten, or stolen, as the memory still fresh flashed (or returned?) in my mind. 

"You begged me to start." He snapped back. 

"That was a mistake." I insisted with a shake of my head. 

"And it kept happening again and again, and again!" He screamed the truth to my face. "You could have walked way after the first time. But you dragged me back in again. You fought me for it."

"I was fighting you away." I argued against the truth. 

"You fought to stay." He replied with disdain. "Regret doesn't wash away the consent that was repeatedly given."

"You shouldn't have done it." I insisted. "When I said stop you fucking stop." 

" _You_ were there too. It takes two to fuck. You _asked_ me. You kept asking me. You wanted me." He replied angrily. "You had me!"

"You took my memories." I snapped back, equally as angry. 

"You asked me to!" He replied. "Just as I took mine. What the hell do you want from me? I gave you everything. Apparently I even gave you back your fucking freedom. You were _mine_ and I gave you up. You gave yourself to me."

"No." I insisted, shaking my head. 

"You took my knot, repeatedly. You never did take Derek's." Peter said with a sneer. "Now, why was that?" 

"You bastard. God, I've always suspected Hales were fucked up. But this is next level. Even beyond an insane parricidal zombie uncle who casually beats his own abandoned daughter." I spat in his direction. His gaze snapped up and he growled angrily in response.

"Then what do exactly want me to do, Stiles? What do you want from me?" He demanded.

The Voices laughed in my ear and leaned in close to whisper their poison. "Secrets and lies. They bury you in secrets and lies. All their affection, all their love, all of it have been a lie. To tie you to them. To bind you to their cause. To cripple you into submission with their warped sensibilities of love and family. This is why you called for us." 

"Tell me. What do you want from me?" Peter demanded madly. 

"Tell me. What do you want from me?" The Voices whispered. 

"I want you to leave me alone!" I screamed back at their faces, breaking the light that surrounded us and plunged us into darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're getting close to the end. Turns out I keep getting inspired to conveniently insert sex scenes in these chapters, even when I hadn't planned for them.

**Author's Note:**

> The tenses are probably all over the place. These chapters were basically train of thought with minimal editing. So sorry for any grammatical, syntax, and tense errors. Hopefully it didn't detract too much in this story and I'll try to find and fix them when I finish. Hope it got you guys off too. Stay safe out there (and in your homes).


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